Friday, March 13, 2015

I'm Not Striving for Perfection

People that are organized in one way or another often look like they have it all together. You might think that from reading my blog or if you know me in person, by being around me. But like all humans, I'm not organized so I can have perfection or attempt to show you that I have it all together. I'm organized because it is how my brain works and I feel more relaxed when I have things in my home that makes sense for me.

I'm just like everyone else at times with sand and dirt on my kitchen floor, bathrooms that need cleaning, piles of papers to be dealt with. I hold on to things, like some artwork from when my girls were young, yearbooks and until recently a sweatshirt from high school! We eat popcorn on the couch, put our feet on the coffee table, forget to eat the oranges and start a refrigerator science experiment. We accumulate trash and dirty laundry because we live in our home, just like you we aren't perfect.

I don't believe in striving for perfection, improvement yes, but not perfection because it doesn't really exist except in magazines, television shows, advertisements and some places on the Internet. And even then it is a manufactured perfection.

I seek a life of balance. And I'm not saying I'm there. I know I'm off balance in several areas of my life. One of those is my use of the computer and the time I spend on it. It has become off balance. There are other things I want to spend my life's hours on then surfing the web for things I didn't even know I wanted or needed. So I have been working on reducing my computer hours this month. I'm not specifically tracking the time, but I do know that I'm spending most of my mornings off of the computer lately. So I'm sure I'm shaving a couple hours off a day! That is an improvement that will help me spend my time in other ways.

I share this so you don't think I have it all together. I don't I'm not perfect, and I'm not even striving to be perfect. Yes, I have my methods and habits that do help us keep a tidy home.  I have goals because I'm looking to improve my life. All of this happens because my mind is wired to think this way and I'm choosing to live this way.

I also want you, my readers, to know I don't have any judgments on how you live your life, how tidy your home is, whether you cleaned your bathroom yesterday or last month. I know what I prefer, but you live in your home, and I live in mine. I do hope that if you aren't happy with how you live in your home that you consider what you want to be different. What can you change to make that happen?

I have found that setting up reminders either in a calendar, on a phone, a note in your car or kitchen table can be the start of a new habit. A couple years ago I realized I was getting lazy with how often I cleaned our sheets. I decided I could handle twice per month. And then I realized that my husband is paid twice per month so I could remember to wash sheets on those same days! It doesn't always happen exactly on payday, but if I have washed the sheets sometime in the few days before or after I'm very pleased. I've been doing this routine for awhile now, so it's a habit.

Do you know what you are striving for? Perfection or improvement and balance?



4 comments:

  1. I just want to make improvements to my home, we're way off from perfection and as you can see from FB we have lots of stuff. It occurred to me the other day that my daughter's room is a big project. I knew it would take time but I didn't realise it would take this long, if you know what I mean? I've been trying to improve it since January continuously. Then again it didn't get like that in a couple of months so it will take more than a few months to improve it.
    There's definetly less clutter in my home thanks to this blog and the facebook page, although I did start following fly lady just before that but I've sort of stopped now (except for swishing and swiping the bathroom sink in the morning and giving the toilet a quick clean).
    I read that every few weeks is the correct amount of time to leave between cleaning your sheets so I need to start that up.

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    1. Some projects are bigger than we think! I like FlyLady too. I think of her occassionally when I clean my kitchen sink. :)

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  2. Improvement and balance indeed!
    I've tried for perfect before, and it is horrible. It's easy to say that I know exactly what I *should* be able to do, and that's great, but I tend to forget that I'm not going to be able to do that every single time. It just doesn't happen (and if by some miracle it does, it doesn't last for long!).
    The internet is full of (well-intentioned) people saying how amazing x, y, and z are, while not mentioning that a, b, and c are lacking in some way. I don't think that anybody has everything under control all the time. Maybe for day, maybe a whole week even, but not much more than that. It's not human. Remembering that we all have times that aren't awesome is so important!

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