Every week is different!
I had a much busier week, which tends to make keeping on top of things at home difficult. However, I kept up with everything for the most part.
This week was a good reminder that not every day is going to go according to plan. My routine was not perfect, not even close. But I don’t need to feel guilty about it. The only reason to feel guilty about something is if I have done something morally wrong. Is it morally wrong that I didn’t wash my dishes on Saturday night when I arrived home after 11 PM? No. Not at all. It’s okay that I collapsed in my bed and chose sleep over cleaning up the kitchen.
Why is that ok?
Because I’m going to clean up again the next day. I have not ruined anything for myself! Sure, my perfectionistic mind might create some guilty feelings of having only 6 out of 7 days complete in a week. I also have a thing for records, as in how-many-days-in-a-row-can-I-complete-this-challenge-perfectly. But that is not the point of this challenge to my daily habits.
The point is to begin exercising self-control over what I do with my free time in my home.
It’s overcoming the guilt to actually DO SOMETHING with my house and my hands. If I let an imperfect day get to me, I’m just succumbing to my previous struggles of controlling my home and its management. It’s really become a battle against irrational guilt. Have I won the war yet? Of course not, but I’m making progress, and that’s where the sense of peace in the home and slower living is coming from.
My goal this week was to establish specific days for specific tasks beyond the daily dish washing and quick room pickups. I didn’t exactly get around to writing it down, but I have the basic ideas floating in my head. I’m going to list them below:
Monday: Cook meals for the week and pack work lunches
Tuesday: Vacuum and mop all floors
Wednesday: Free day!
Thursday: Clean bathrooms and showers
Friday: Dust and vacuum
Saturday: Run laundry and remake beds
Sunday: Pick up groceries for the week and wipe down stove
Now that I’ve written it out, each day seems easily managed! Rather than cramming all of these household activities on my occasional completely-free Saturdays, I’m dealing with weekly cleaning tasks each day of the week. It’s going to give similar results to my work washing dishes every day and picking up the floor everyday. I will actually spend less time taking care of my house, and it will stay cleaner consistently. At least, I hope it will! But I have no reason to doubt the system at this point.
Until next week . . .
What new concept am I going to encounter this week? Who knows! But what I do know is that I’m having a fabulous time managing my house. Here’s to another week learning to work well in my home. 🙂
Enjoy your Tuesday, and go read a book!
