Tuesday, October 13, 2015

TGBKA: Staying Organized!

I'm afraid I suffer from "not enough syndrome". It's not a greed thing.... rather, it's a substantial thing. I don't walk through life saying to myself, "I don't have enough money". Nor do I think, "I don't have enough stuff." But I sure do spend much of my life saying things like this to myself:

"I'm not efficient enough"

"This isn't organized enough"

"I'm not effective enough"

"I'm not enough enough"

Seriously... it's a wonder how Sweet Baboo puts up with me so gracefully. He has definitely grown wise with age because he has agreed to use this brilliant (if I do say so myself) tool:

It's a secret "group" on Facebook that is for only myself and him! This has saved so many conversations for us. Seriously! Sweet Baboo is 14 hours ahead of us. So when it's 10:00 in the morning here, and I have a random thought that I need his opinion/input/wisdom for, picking up the phone and calling him at midnight (his time) makes for a Cranky Baboo. Mainly because he has morning formation that the higher powers expect him to cheerfully participate in. So I put a post on the page, and patiently wait for him to respond.
My plea for participation may have something to do with his immediate acceptance of this idea.
And guess what? We aren't using the private message function of Facebook to communicate as much. This is a huge bonus because I am not spending an insane amount of time scrolling back up through fifty bajillion messages to find one piece of information. The group allows us to have organized conversations about several topics at the same time with the reply option to each comment in the thread. For instance:

The most organized way to hold a conversation with a human who sprints through life with ADD. There are literally 11 conversations going on in this thread, and I left the thread feeling completely informed and not confused at all. GLORIOUS!
I had our first pack out today, and I spent much of my weekend feeling like I was forgetting most of the important things. So I started a thread specifically for the express shipment. I took photos of each room and asked Sweet Baboo to let me know if he saw anything that I was forgetting. Then I went to our storage unit and asked him to let me know if he needed anything there. (Most of his professional equipment is there, and I can't shake the feeling that he didn't take enough of it with him). Each thought is completely different from any other in the thread; if we were to have had this conversation in the private messages function in Facebook most of the thoughts would have been missed or misunderstood. Responses are given directly to the individual thought, allowing for answers that need few (if any) clarification. It's delightful!

This group may not get shut down when we move to Korea. I love having the ability to put down my random thoughts in an area that is only for Sweet Baboo and myself (since it's a secret group, others won't be able to find it, or join it, unless we invite them to do so). When he's on a trip, I can keep up the communication with him about our household needs. It's great! I'm not feeling like our communication isn't efficient enough any more. Why did it take me this long to come up with this idea?



3 comments:

  1. I wish my husband was on fb we could use this since we don't communicate. .. lol you may save marriages with this idea KatieBeth

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  2. I wish my husband was on fb we could use this since we don't communicate. .. lol you may save marriages with this idea KatieBeth

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tori,
    Sweet Baboo keeps threatening to "quit Facebook". Honestly, I'm not sure how we would communicate some times without it! The voice and video calling has saved our phone bill... the clarity of both are stellar and we don't have to pay international rates on the calls! Plus, I'm able to send him links to things I want (can anybody say "ROOMBA???") and tag him in photos of the girls and me while he's gone. It really is how we stay connected when he's away. But when he's home, and the schedule is super busy, it's helpful as well.

    I'll stop sounding like a Facebook commercial now.

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