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Section 24
“Let’s Get Organized” Method

Question 24 found at the bottom of this page
Test | Table of Contents

The following organization technique can help your client, whether an adult or a child, feel less harried and overwhelmed in general. As you know, dysthymic clients can be so wrapped up in negative emotion that they feel overwhelmed and frozen into an action. The following seven steps can assist you in treating your clients who are frozen into inactivity.

1. Plan: Have your client write down what they have to do each day. This shortens the time spent mentally reviewing their obligations. It also helps reduce anxiety over possibly forgetting an important task and alerts them to the possibility that their expectations for one day are not realistic.

2. Prioritize: Help your client understand the importance of this step by having them picture the chaos that would result in a hospital emergency room if all the patients were assumed to be equally in need of immediate attention. Not only would the staff be in a state of panic, but while they were hurrying to care for those with minor problems, the patients with more serious difficulties would expire. The idea of equal importance obviously does not make sense in an emergency room, and it does not make sense in their life either. Instead of the client treating all their responsibilities as if they were urgent and equal to one another, have them prioritize the items on their “to do” list. Each time they have to make a decision about how to use their time, let their preset priorities be their guide.

3. Delegate: Help them identify any items on their daily schedule or “to do” list that other people could do or help them do. They need to give up the unproductive notion that to have something done right they must do it themselves. Also, stress to them that requesting assistance is not a sign of weakness and that they should go ahead and ask for the help they need. Also, suggest to them that they can save additional time by allowing the people whose help they’ve requested to do as they’ve asked without hovering over them, checking up on them, or going back to improve upon the job when it is finished.

4. Stop assuming unwanted responsibility, especially other people’s: For example, if their co-workers want to take up a collection and send flowers to their recuperating supervisor, they need to understand that they do not have to be the one to do it. Another example, if their daughters want to go to the mall, they do not have to drive them both ways or at all. If such nonessential activities are adding more drudgery and no satisfaction to your client’s life, tell them to stop doing them. Doing this will take even more pressure off and cut down on feelings of resentment if they stop doing things for other people that they are perfectly capable of doing themselves or that your client does not have to do such as picking up their children’s dirty socks from the floor, getting their husband’s shirts from the laundry, taking a co-worker’s calls when he is out of the office.

5. Combine or condense activities whenever possible: Suggest to your client that they pay bills while watching TV, or have their son do his homework in the kitchen so that they can help him while they cook dinner. Shop for groceries twice a week instead of three, help them learn how to organize errands so that they do the least amount of driving. These are just a few ways to combine or condense tasks and obligations in order for your client to save time and feel more in control of their life.

6. Reduce the amount of time spent “lost in thought”: As you know, the tendency for those suffering from depression to get lost in thought means it will take them longer to complete a task. Mentally drifting off into space is a difficult habit to break, but having your client purchase a watch with an alarm or an inexpensive kitchen timer may help. If they set the/alarm to go off after a specific amount of time or at fifteen-minute intervals, it will interrupt any trances they may have fallen into and get them back on track.

7. Respect your inner time clock: Your client probably knows from experience whether or not they are a morning person or that they seem to run out of steam at four in the afternoon and get a second wind by five-thirty or six. You can help them use this self-knowledge to their advantage and get more done in less time if they schedule complex or tiring tasks for the times when they have the most energy.

“Personal Reflection” Journaling Activity #4
The preceding section was about the “Let’s Get Organized” Method. Write three case study examples regarding how you might use the content of this section of the Manual or the “Positive Reinforcement” section of the audio tape in your practice.

QUESTION 24:
How could someone reduce the amount of time “lost in thought?”