Testimonials: Columns
“Angela Hoxsey is an organizational Maven. She is fast, efficient and a pleasure to work with. Angela makes getting and staying organized easy with her helpful tips, tricks and knowledge of organizational products. I hired Angela to help me prior to and after a large home remodel. She helped me to declutter, purge and organize multiple rooms in my home. I loved working with Angela, she helped me streamline my home and I enjoy the organizational benefits everyday! ”
Susanne Hudson, Napa, CA
“I’m thrilled with what you helped create. It totally blows my mind how quickly you work and I love your thought process. Fantastic!!”
Dona Bonick, Kopol Bonick Photography, Napa CA
“Angela is always thinking about my organizing issues and often sends suggestions and helpful advice and ideas, even when she is not physically on the job with me. She comes up with unique solutions completely customized to my business, home and personal style—things that I never would have thought of on my own...”
“I can totally trust Angela’s taste and rely on her honesty about what’s working and what’s not with regards to my wardrobe. That said, she is always respectful—if I say I want to keep something, she respects my wishes...”
“I have a lot of “stuff”, and Angela has always been non-judgmental about my collections, while helping me to make smart decisions about how to lose things that I do not need. I value her wisdom, her experience and her perspective. She is a joy to work with, I look forward to our time together and dread to think what my home, closet, garage, life would look like without her expert guidance!”
T. Beller, Verve Napa Valley
“Angela is my dream girl! I was referred to her to help me prepare to move after living in one house for 27 years. She was fantastic in helping me get organized and declutter years of gathering too much of everything...!”
“Angela took me from panic, and an overwhelming moving experience, to an organized new home. She is a pleasure to work with, has lots of energy, while always maintaining a positive attitude. I think she is "THE BEST"!!!”
Sheila Sosnow, Piedmont, CA
“Have you ever accidentally run across someone who just COMPLETELY changed your every day life for the better? And you couldn't imagine your life without them? That's how I feel about Angela. Angela came into my fairly organized but slightly hectic life completely by chance. I wasn't looking for anyone to help me organize or streamline my life because I didn't really think I NEEDED it. And just in the same way that she seemed to just quietly float into my life, she helped me with such kindess, grace and ease.”
Lindsey Wiseman, St. Helena, CA
“Angela has a real gift for seeing what needs to be done and pulling it all together. I have worked with many organizers in the past, but none as efficient and focused as she. From my office to the garage, Angela has helped create a system that works
for the long term!”Karen Schuppert, Napa, CA
“Angela Hoxsey was the best referral that I have ever gotten. Needing to get my house ready to sell and declutter the 20 years worth of accumulation was no easy task. She was fast, efficient and a joy to work with. The best part of working with her was her cheerful yet no nonsense way of getting you to decide 'keep, trash or donate'. . . Love it!”
Cherie Melka, St. Helena, CA
“We spent four hours organizing an enormous amount of paperwork and I feel like I just got a massage!”Joanne Maher, St. Helena, CA
“Whether you are prone to chaos, pretty organized yourself, or a combination of both, Angela Hoxsey can help you bring order to your home. Yes, you could do it yourself, but most of us have so many competing demands on our time that organizing tasks easily fall by the wayside. Angela has brought her professional touch to my home, demonstrating every time
the lasting value of an expert.”Karen Saeger, Ph.D., Berkeley
“You can smell the sanity. Angela is worth her weight in diamonds.”
Masako Takahashi, artist;
San Miguel de Allende/San Francisco
Columns
Not So Great Expectations
I’m trying to go into 2018 without any expectations. 2017 was an “everything but the kitchen sink” year of disasters, shootings, #metoo horror stories, nuclear missile tests and the constant barrage of tweets. It was quite the cluttered year; sort of a hoard of deplorable events. I’ve been thinking about how to make 2018 different, even though I have absolutely no influence on Mother Nature or Kim Jong-Un.
First of all I’m going to stop watching the news obsessively. Our October wildfires and the December wildfires in southern California got me hooked on the news in a very unhealthy way. It helped me feel connected during the fires, but now it’s more of a frazzled, irritable and “world could end at any moment” sort of feeling, which is probably reasonable but is not helpful to anybody.
Second, I’m going to lower my expectations, in fact, I’m going to try not to have expectations at all. If you don’t expect to be able to charge up your phone and other devices when you get to the airport, you won’t be disappointed if the power fails, as it did at the Atlanta airport in 2017. You may spend your vacation at the airport, but at least you’ll be able to text your friends and read books on Kindle unlike all those people with high expectations of electricity and WiFi. Fools!
Seriously though, lowered expectations are surprisingly helpful for achieving goals. When I tell myself I only have to do 20 minutes on the treadmill, or even just five, I almost always exceed that minimal amount. If I tell myself I only need to declutter one area, often the whole house gets a sprucing without any angst. If I take things one day at a time—like no sugary snacks, just for today—the string of days can add up to weeks and months, seemingly with no effort.
I’m not going to set any resolutions this year, are you? 2017 kind of beat the ol’ habit of starting the new year with better habits out of me. I’m tired of rules, and my husband is really, thoroughly tired of rules. That’s not to say I won’t remind him to put the dirty dishes in the sink. For the millionth time.
But I’m hoping to get back into an optimistic frame of mind by the time you read this. Turning off the news will definitely improve my mood and free up some hours. Exercise also never lets me down—if nothing else, a workout is always a little “win” for the day. Other things that have worked for me that I intend to embrace again are gratitude lists (writing down three or more things you are grateful for each day); community service (to be part of the solution, which makes the problems seem so much less daunting); and meditation (the first thing I always chuck when I get busy or stressed even though I know that ten minutes of meditation in the morning makes the day much better).
Something new that has really helped lift my mood is cryotherapy, which involves a “cold sauna” machine developed for arthritis in the 1970s. Cryotherapy is now used by professional athletes such as LeBron James and peak performers like Tony Robbins to battle a variety of injuries and ailments. Napa now has a cryotherapy provider in town at the Gitali Institute on First Street near California (www.cryoaid.com, 707-726-2653). I love it and would do it every day if I could.
Cold therapy and hot yoga were the best habits I developed in 2017 and will continue with in 2018. Sometimes pushing through discomfort (extreme cold, purging paper in the office, the last set of abdominal exercises) is what’s necessary to progress. And if you keep your expectations in check, the results will feel even better.