I always considered myself a very adaptable person, however, recently I had to make a change in my life that I found very difficult to do. Let me explain.
Growing up, my Mother was very good at giving me and my sibling’s responsibilities. We had jobs to do at regular times and days, but our big cleaning day was always Friday’s. It was always so nice to get all the cleaning done and then on Saturdays we would not have jobs, or we did extra jobs as needed.
I carried this schedule with me when I got married and we started having our own family. Mind you, I don’t enjoy cleaning like some people do, but I love a clean home, so I crank up the Bollywood tunes and dance my way through it, keeping my mind on the prize. Over the years, my kids wore me down as to how much, and how well they did their “jobs” but we always stuck with the “Friday was our big cleaning day” schedule.
Recently, I have taken on more “things” in my life, namely starting an in-home business, which I love and am happy to do, but all these extra things seemed to constantly prevent me from having the time to get my entire home cleaned by Friday afternoon. For several months, I was discouraged by not getting it done all at the same time, and it seemed like I was always cleaning instead of ever getting it done! I finally accepted the fact that I would never have a clean house all at once!
I realized that since I am at home all day on Monday’s, without any set commitments, that maybe I should start to do my cleaning on Mondays! I resisted this thought for several weeks because, well, it just wasn’t “me”!
Getting more frustrated I looked at my schedule one day and realized that just for one time only, I would clean on Monday. The house is usually a bit messy on Monday’s because we have the kids and grand kids over for Sunday dinner each week, so I was “cleaning” anyway, but this time I did the thorough cleaning that I normally did on Fridays. The result was magical!!! Not only did I have time to get it done, but it was so nice to START the week with a clean house instead of END the week with a clean house.
So I learned from this experience that I need to be more adaptable when it comes to routine things in my life. I have always had a schedule with a daily list of things to tick off, but now I know I can move things around and still get to tick chores and errands off a list so that I feel I have accomplished something that day.
In other words I have “loosened up” without having to compromise things that are important to me. This was a BIG step for me!!!
Growing up, my Mother was very good at giving me and my sibling’s responsibilities. We had jobs to do at regular times and days, but our big cleaning day was always Friday’s. It was always so nice to get all the cleaning done and then on Saturdays we would not have jobs, or we did extra jobs as needed.
I carried this schedule with me when I got married and we started having our own family. Mind you, I don’t enjoy cleaning like some people do, but I love a clean home, so I crank up the Bollywood tunes and dance my way through it, keeping my mind on the prize. Over the years, my kids wore me down as to how much, and how well they did their “jobs” but we always stuck with the “Friday was our big cleaning day” schedule.
Recently, I have taken on more “things” in my life, namely starting an in-home business, which I love and am happy to do, but all these extra things seemed to constantly prevent me from having the time to get my entire home cleaned by Friday afternoon. For several months, I was discouraged by not getting it done all at the same time, and it seemed like I was always cleaning instead of ever getting it done! I finally accepted the fact that I would never have a clean house all at once!
Then I had an epiphany!!!
Getting more frustrated I looked at my schedule one day and realized that just for one time only, I would clean on Monday. The house is usually a bit messy on Monday’s because we have the kids and grand kids over for Sunday dinner each week, so I was “cleaning” anyway, but this time I did the thorough cleaning that I normally did on Fridays. The result was magical!!! Not only did I have time to get it done, but it was so nice to START the week with a clean house instead of END the week with a clean house.
So I learned from this experience that I need to be more adaptable when it comes to routine things in my life. I have always had a schedule with a daily list of things to tick off, but now I know I can move things around and still get to tick chores and errands off a list so that I feel I have accomplished something that day.
In other words I have “loosened up” without having to compromise things that are important to me. This was a BIG step for me!!!
