getting happier about boring housework
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In a message dated 3/5/03 1:09:35 AM, pamsoroosh@... writes:
<< Housekeeping is NEVER my forte - I HATE it. I'd like to figure out how
to do it with all that wonderful calm joyful attitude that people here
talk about it - but to me it is boring boring boring and more boring.
When I'm not feeling great, too, I just can't make myself do much of it. >>
You don't have to do so much of it, just a little.
I mean if you wanted to practice the attitude.
Put on music you can sing along to and that will make you feel like dancing,
and it makes the time go by more happily. Or plan a presentation in your
head, or be making a list for something (have the paper and pencil there, but
work cleaning whatever until you think of another item.
That's what I do, anyway, is I do two things at once and the housework is the
mindless one.
I used to HATE the resentment of "Why should *I* do this?" and so I just
decided to change what I thought about what "this" was and why anyone had to
do it. It was a philosophical shift. But I still like to play music.
Floors, I don't like. I need to really steam clean the carpet in the
library, but it would involve putting so many things up I can't think of
doing it. But when it gets springlike I'll ask the kids to help me get the
floor clear, and open the doors and windows up there and just DO it. It will
kill a whole day but I'll play loud music and sing and get it done. And
we'll all be happier for a while, in that room. Other teens have taken to
coming and gaming there a couple of times a week, and it's still a dormitory
when necessary (concerts and SCA events bring relatives and friends from
outlying towns), and the kids feel as much ownership and need of that as they
do their own rooms, for sure.
I'll never have a really spiffy, decorated house. But I have figured out
ways to accept that instead of berating myself, and ways to be happier when I
DO declutter and clean.
Sandra
<< Housekeeping is NEVER my forte - I HATE it. I'd like to figure out how
to do it with all that wonderful calm joyful attitude that people here
talk about it - but to me it is boring boring boring and more boring.
When I'm not feeling great, too, I just can't make myself do much of it. >>
You don't have to do so much of it, just a little.
I mean if you wanted to practice the attitude.
Put on music you can sing along to and that will make you feel like dancing,
and it makes the time go by more happily. Or plan a presentation in your
head, or be making a list for something (have the paper and pencil there, but
work cleaning whatever until you think of another item.
That's what I do, anyway, is I do two things at once and the housework is the
mindless one.
I used to HATE the resentment of "Why should *I* do this?" and so I just
decided to change what I thought about what "this" was and why anyone had to
do it. It was a philosophical shift. But I still like to play music.
Floors, I don't like. I need to really steam clean the carpet in the
library, but it would involve putting so many things up I can't think of
doing it. But when it gets springlike I'll ask the kids to help me get the
floor clear, and open the doors and windows up there and just DO it. It will
kill a whole day but I'll play loud music and sing and get it done. And
we'll all be happier for a while, in that room. Other teens have taken to
coming and gaming there a couple of times a week, and it's still a dormitory
when necessary (concerts and SCA events bring relatives and friends from
outlying towns), and the kids feel as much ownership and need of that as they
do their own rooms, for sure.
I'll never have a really spiffy, decorated house. But I have figured out
ways to accept that instead of berating myself, and ways to be happier when I
DO declutter and clean.
Sandra