Lost in Your Room: How To Find Anything!
January 20, 2010 | Alicia Ostarello
No matter how messy your dorm room is, everything lost can be found!
Everything in college is a bit cramped, from the desk in your favorite lecture hall to the amount of personal space in your dorm room. But size cannot stop the inevitable from happening – you’re going to lose something important one day, and no matter how hard you look, you’ll struggle to find it.
Thankfully, you don’t have to rely only upon praying to the patron saint of lost items, Saint Anthony, in order to find what you’re looking for (though that might not be a bad idea if you’re really at a loss!). Here’s a few quick ways to organize a search for any misplaced homework assignment, student ID, or bicycle lock:
1. Think About the Problem, Then Step Back
Since the item that has fizzled into oblivion is yours, you were probably the last person to have touched it; thus, it is stuck way back in your memory bank. All you have to do is go to the teller in your mind and ask to withdraw it – in other words, find that hazy-lazy remembrance in the back of your head, and you’ll be led right to where your lost whatchamcallit is!
2. Deep, Deeper, Deepest Breaths
Losing something is stressful, but having a meltdown will not aid in its recovery. Stress can make you sick in the stomach, the heart, and even in the mind, so the best way to help yourself look with a clear head is to stay calm. Take a moment to do something incredibly relaxing, like sipping chamomile tea, reading your favorite poem, or settling into the yoga position of your choosing (I recommend downward dog!). Once your head is settled, you’ll be able to glance around the room with fresh eyes.
3. Enlist Your Pals
Roommates, suitemates, and BFF’s are perfect partners when it comes to a manhunt for what you’ve lost hold of. Asking friends to assist you in your search widens the numbers of eyes and brains concentrated on the task. Not only will your friends be helpful, they’ll also keep you entertained as you search.
4. Cease the Search
Prowling your room, backpack, and all the other obvious places you’re sure to look is a great way to start looking for missing items, but if it has not uncovered what you’re missing, you’ll benefit from not spending any more time on the problem. Taking a break from your sleuthing through your closet, desk drawers, and under the bed can help you remember where you last saw the missing article.
You’re sure to lose something in the next four years of college – but remember, everything can be found with patience, logic, and a little bit of pixie dust! Okay, maybe not pixie dust; but ingenuity can help.
Have you lost anything special to you? Did you replace it, or are you still certain it will appear?
I’ll never forget the time my boyfriend couldn’t find his car keys and I caught him looking for them in the freezer. I seriously thought about breaking up with him for that because A: looking in the freezer for lost car keys is crazy, and B: to be crazy enough to put your car keys in the freezer is frightening. I’m still a little uncertain of his sanity after that stunt, but he has other great qualities that make up for the lapse in judgement. Now, if he had actually found his lost car keys in the freezer, it would have been a deal breaker for sure.