Light Desk for a Light Work

As a professor, pastor and psychologist at the same time, I spend many hours working at my desk. Multitasking, I admit, is not always as easy as theory. But systematizing — that includes keeping my desk light — somehow helps in keeping my work light. Let me share some guidelines:

Keep your desk clear. An unsightly desk multiplies stress and pressure. It makes you feel tired than usual (and look older, too). Clutters tell you, “Look at how much more tasks are waiting ahead.” Have a separate table for your tools. Don’t squeeze your computer, typewriter, bag, paper cutter, books and all onto of your desk. Bring out only those things you work on at the moment, and keep them away before you commence with the next task. Update your corkboard regularly so it doesn’t get jammed with unintelligible reminders.

Keep your desk neat. Plan out how you can file the stuffs you receive (or create) so that you can locate them in a second when you need them. Put those pins together in a small box. Assign a fixed place for your table tools — stapler, stamps, correction fluid, etc. — and return them (as you would with any other things) on the same place after using. Stack papers that belong together in clearly labeled folders. Anyone who justifies, “Eh masmabilis nga akong magtrabaho kung magulo ang mesa,” simply denotes, “I don’t even have time to sort my filthy undergarments from clean ones. Why should I sort my desk out?”

Keep your desk plain. Remove the pictures and decorations under your desktop glass: they don’t belong there. Use table ornaments sparingly, if at all. When seen mixed with other stuffs, they are perceived by our brain more as mess than as inspirations. Even rubbles look better when put on a plain background. Soothing to the eyes, a plain, ornament-free desktop is most conducive to working.

Keep your desk clean. Many people sip coffee, nibble nuts, or even chomp a full lunch right at their workstation. This is perfectly all right, assuming there are no other better places to eat. But be sure to clean up your desk afterwards. Your janitor has so much to do aside from cleaning your crumbs and scouring your mug marks away. And it pays to exert extra effort to dust your workstation regularly. There is no doze of “adaptation” that is enough to make you work more effectively in a grimy area than you would in a clean, fresh-looking one.

Keep your desk bright. Most of us would carry out tasks best in a moderately illuminated workstation. Gone are the days when one had to ruin his eyes and wear glasses just to secure some amount of esteem. Relocate your table to a place where it (and you) can receive enough lighting. Rearrange your office in such a way that furniture and decorations do not obstruct sources of light. Let sunshine peer though your window blinds. Replace dim bulbs with daylight lamps.

What bamboozle many workers are not those “too many tasks,” but those few tasks that appear too many — often because of a muddled workstation. Imagine trying to locate a small note that means life and death for your company. Or remember those long times you ravage in disastrous attempts to track down a “lost” report (which you later find innocently hibernating in your bag, or drawer, or filing cabinet, or between pages of whatever that has pages).
So next time you enter your office, you know what to do first. And last.