Tidiness: Time sink, or effectiveness booster?

[Manomanman]

Title says it all. Is being tidy in your workspace (and in some cases, your living space) a productivity-booster, or a time sink that just takes away from your ability to produce whatever it is you produce.

By tidiness, I'm talking specifically about "higher level cleaning" (things like spotlessness, removal of dirt and debris), not about basic and necessary organization.

I ask, because I feel like I'm the odd-man out: my motivation and therefore productivity is higher when I'm tidy.

[Inthon]

I do that stuff while watching TV. I make it a passive chore, not active.

[ragtag]

I feel more comfortable when it's reasonably clean and organized around me, which I believe also makes me more productive, but it doesn't need to be completely spotless and squeeky clean. It's a balance. If you keep things spotless all the time, you're going to spend too much time cleaning, and thus going to be less productive. And if you never clean, your mind (mine anyway), will feel disorganized and little desire to work in all this mess.

[Plato]

It doesn't take much time to be tidy.

[Manomanman]

Originally Posted by ragtag

I feel more comfortable when it's reasonably clean and organized around me, which I believe also makes me more productive, but it doesn't need to be completely spotless and squeeky clean.

When I'm playing MMORPGs, I constantly take trips to the auction house to sell off the valuable items, vendor the vendor trash, and place items I need later in the bank.

I can't continue questing until my bags are completely clear of clutter and organized...but it takes time away from playing the game to regularly "clean" like this.

My brother, on the other hands, just has random crap in all of his bags, his bank is full of stuff that he never uses, and he has useless "mementos" which are rare weapons that he's outleveled. I have no idea how he even loots anything

A real-world illustration would be: keeping the files on my computer organized. My productivity falls off as the entropy level on my file structure increases...and not because it's harder to find things. Just because I'm "irritated" by the disorganization. It's just in the back of my mind until I "purge" and clean it all up. And then I'm no longer distracted and go back into a "flow" state.

It's on the border of being neurotic and perfectionistic, but I also feel like its adaptive, such that being fastidious leads to greater cleanliness which lowers the chance of infectious disease.