Yes, I have been thinking about this kind of stuff a lot lately. It befuddles me and so I am trying to figure it out. You know how when you get a room clean. . I mean really clean and so you want to keep it that way right? You are putting away the littlest things to keep it looking nice. Wipe off the counter at the first sign of smears. You have seen the room's potential and you want it to live up to it.
Somehow though, a week or so down the road, that room is a mess again. At what point did you stop thinking it was worth picking up every little thing? At what point did you forget that you want that room as nice as it looked when you first cleaned it or at what point did you stop caring so much? I believe stress and tiredness may be the ones to blame.
When I am too stressed, I have other things to worry about that are more important than picking up those shoes or hanging up that outfit I tried on and decided against. It can wait until I am less occupied. I have noticed that when I have a lot on my mind, my physical surroundings just don't seem so important anymore. In this oblivious state, the little messes can get bigger and bigger without my noticing. I know when a big stress has been lifted or I am better rested because suddenly my eyes are opened to the mess around me and I start picking up little things again. I realize, that I have been putting up with that shoe that has been sitting in the hallway for a week now.
I also find that if I am tired or stressed a few dishes to clean seem like a sink full of dishes. One basket full of laundry feels like just too much for me to deal with. I just need a nap and I will take care of it later. I don't take care of that one basket and then it does become two baskets or 3 and suddenly it is so much that, the house work it's self has become the stresser. Suddenly I am swimming in an ocean of laundry and I wonder how I fell off that last wave of productivity.
Going back to my last blog entry, it is always the being too tired or having other stuff to worry about that gets in the way of pushing off and starting my day off right. Even if it is trying to avoid stress by procrastinating. I don't know how many times I have jumped on the computer to avoid that sink of dishes. Lets face it, a sink full of dishes is stressful!
I probably think way too much about housework. Maybe if I worked as much as I think about it, I wouldn't get so buried in it all the time.
4 comments:
Kristin, you are awesome and exactly right. I know some people clean when they are stressed or worried. That is NOT me. My physical surroundings totally take second place to what is happening emotionally. Today is a perfect, prime example. I have MOUNTAINS of laundry to put away, and a living room floor I am certain is not difficult to keep clean, yet it hasn't been clean for over a week. And right now, emotionally, I need to go sit in the tub for a while and deal with all that later. (I actually find I work much faster under dead-line stress, but often it is too late for me to meet the dead-line, which is probably why I am late to things all the time. I know all this to be true, but I still have a hard time changing the behavior.)
I hadnt thought about that. When I am frustrated, I do like to clean but there is a difference between frustration and real stress or despair. One is needing to blow off steam. The other two are not having any steam whatsoever.
Good post. I agree. And, mostly, it's more fun to ponder the philosophy of it all than to actually clean.
I have the same problem with my kitchen. I just realized this morning what a mess it had become. I usually run my dishwasher every night but the dishes I have to wash by hand (pots and pans) are the ones that stack up. Then I get stressed because there are dishes stacked up so I avoid the stack while it gets bigger. Then I'll put on music and start washing them and it goes so quickly that I wonder why I put it off. Ugh!
Sometimes I think that I should get rid of a bunch of my dishes and cookware so I HAVE to wash them every night.
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