It's all starting to hit me

I listed my house on Monday of this week... so it's officially on the market! My first showing is tomorrow afternoon. It's quite a milestone after all this work.

Today I toured 3 apartment complexes... and it touched off a wave of anxiety on my part. The first one was a little older than I expected and not what I envisioned. The second was OK. The third one was a good location, but again not as nice as I had envisioned. I suddenly started thinking "oh my god what have I done." I'm giving up all this space... what if I don't find anything as nice as my house? What if work moves me somewhere close to here and I choose a place closer to downtown? Will I wish that everything just goes back to status quo? It's comfortable here! Maybe I screwed up and owning a house isn't that bad?

I re-read a chapter in a book I'm reading called Get Out of Your Own Way entitled Backing Down Because You Don't Feel Ready. In each chapter, it provides a little nugget, or a takeaway. This chapter's takeaway was "Just because you're nervous doesn't mean you're not ready." It's normal to have anxiety and be a little nervous when making a change. It's nice to read those words again, but I'm still a little anxious and hopefully I'll be able to fall asleep soon...

House update

The house is now officially all fixed up and cleaned. Only thing left is to do some staging... which will be tough since my furniture consists of second hand couches, coffee tables, a folding table, dressers and drawers from my childhood, and cheap office furniture from Staples. Oh and of course a futon I slept on in college.

The hardest thing to do now will be to keep the house showable. It really goes against what I'm used to doing... that is let things pile up, then take care of it all in one shot. Maybe it'll be a good thing for me to learn.

Some interesting things I found:

• Cable bill from 2001 (my cable was $23 a month back in the apartments)
• My rejection letters from college... including two from P&G (and of course one acceptance letter from P&G)
• My acceptance letter to the University of Wisconsin, University of Illinois, and Cal Tech (I have absolutely ZERO regrets going to Madison)
• A bunch of postcards from my friends I had kept, including stuff from college. Many are at least still Facebook friends.

Also, my beloved Brewers chair is now in the basement. But don't worry, where ever I end up, it'll be back in a prominent place!

Figuring myself out: Why I have a messy room

This latest insight was so interesting that I had to blog about it... It came out of a book called The Birth Order Book. I'm a first born, so I skipped to the chapter about firstborns. It talked about how first borns tend to be perfectionists because the only role model in their lives was their parents. So they would strive to be just like them, which is pretty hard for a 2 year old.

Sounds interesting... but I'm not a perfectionist by any means! I keep my desk as messy as the cubicle police will allow at work, my house has taken a TON of effort to clean up to the point of being presentable, and I have trouble completing tasks once I get it started. But the book then had an interesting insight... "Slobs and poor students are usually discouraged perfectionists who have given up trying because it hurts too much to fail." I wouldn't call myself a poor student, but I can definitely see why I don't like cleaning. It's because when I was growing up, cleaning was a process that didn't have a ending. I would clean my room, and my dad would always find one more thing that needed to be cleaned better. I'd proclaim myself done, and he'd come by and point out 2-3 more things that needed to be done (he also was a first born... perfectionist label fits him pretty well!).

So I guess I gave up trying for perfection. I think in general, this is the root cause of a lot of my unwillingness to clean, organize, or plan. Or at least complete it. I'm subconsciously thinking that I'll be criticized, and avoiding criticism is more important than doing the task.

Of course, I should be grown up and mature enough to not have that bother me. A lot of this is inside my head. But how does one get over this? I'm looking for another book...

Updates

Project sell the house is coming along... tomorrow they finish painting the house. Wednesday the handyman is coming over to fix some random stuff, and the flooring people are going to replace the carpeting and flooring. I'm hoping to get the house listed next week.

Some places I've looked at living next are Blue Ash, Kenwood, Hyde Park, Oakley, and Downtown. Blue Ash was leading before, but now I think Downtown has taken the lead. Ideally somewhere with a nice view. My only concern is where does one get groceries when living downtown?