Unmade Bed Theory
blogThe evidence for broken window theory — the idea that the presence of litter and graffiti encourage people to commit more crime — continues to stack up. Human beings, it seems, respond badly to neglect. This ties in with my Unmade Bed Theory, whereby I become more virtuous the tidier my flat is. A discarded sock soon becomes a mountain of dirty laundry; a sink full of washing up turns into mental lethargy and physical slovenliness.
Tidying the flat, though, is only the beginning. For every coat put in a cupboard you seen a new universe of disorder open up before you. Shoes should be lined up, socks separated from pants, books in alphabetical order. And then there are all the notes you’ve jotted down and all the projects you have committed to completing, each one of these represents a level of disorder. Dylan said: I accept chaos, but I’m not sure if chaos accepts me. Me? I don’t accept chaos but chaos doesn’t care and hugs me to its bosom.
Most people assume that order is a slippery slope and that if you start arranging books and cds, you’ll end up counting lamposts as you walk down the street. However, it’s easy to avoid such obsessive behaviour: just ensure that your intentions are positive (achieve more focus) rather than negative (remove all that is aberrant).