I think there’s a misconception when people think of productivity and assume it means perfection. Here’s the thing: I am a super productive person. I can get all the to-do lists done, get my kids where they need to be, accomplish my work at my “real” job, and function as a human. This does NOT mean that I have it all together all the time.
I have two kids and a husband who works opposite shifts than I do, which means when I come home from work, it’s go, go, go to the kids’ activities, make dinner, and get the tiny humans to bed. When I’m not here, it also means three people are living at the house and making a mess.
Don’t get me wrong. My family has responsibilities, and they all help out around the house; however, kids come with some sort of trickery that no matter how many times toys are cleaned up, there’s a trail of more toys following. Eventually these tiny messes accumulate into giant, anxiety-inducing tragedies.
And this is life. And it’s ok. But there comes a time that it needs to be taken care of. My house was recently in this disarray. No matter where I turned, there were piles of paperwork needing to be filed, loads of laundry waiting to be washed or put away, and remnants of little people’s possessions everywhere. I would walk in my door and immediately cringe. I wouldn’t be able to breathe. I can’t stand not feeling comfortable in my own home.
We need to take care of ourselves, and this means taking care of our spaces. Because I haven’t had time to be at home and really tackle the things that needed to be done lately, I took a vacation day from work to do just that. Some may say that’s a waste of a day, but my feelings about this are vacation days are meant to do things for yourself. Organizing and making my space cleaner does mean I’m taking care of myself.
I communicated with my family that I’d be home that day in order to take care of the mess we’ve created. They had until that set day to clean up whatever parts were theirs. If it wasn’t clean, it was gone. This wasn’t their first rodeo, and they got to action because they know I mean business. By giving everyone fair warning that I’m coming through their rooms on a mission, a lot of the mess is actually taken care of beforehand. Sidenote: this teaches your kids time management and responsibility because they know they have a set date to get things done, and they have to plan how they’ll make it happen. This might mean giving up Minecraft for a day…GASP!
Depending on the situation of your home, you may not be able to tackle all of the things at once, but by dedicating a day to certain projects, you’ve made the big task at hand a lot more manageable. By eliminating the bigger part of the mess, you can then take care of the smaller things each day, one project at a time.
Just because your house or space may not always be perfect, it doesn’t mean you aren’t productive. Sometimes we just need to find the time in order to get the things done that we know will take a little longer. And afterward, we feel so much better, which is what really matters.
