I didn’t make as much progress last week as I planned because I ended up finding and buying a new elliptical machine and most of my time was spent getting the elliptical and setting it up.
One nugget I read in Tidying which I found valuable and had experience implementing was the advice to always begin with m own mess before I get annoyed with the messes other people make.
This came up yesterday when I found myself feeling upset with my family because the kitchen was a big mess and I had spent a couple hours the day before getting the kitchen completely clean. Now there were dirty dishes seemingly on every possible surface: countertops, the stove, and tables. The sink was filled with dirty dishes. And even though we have plenty of drawers and cabinets, food and clean dishes hadn’t yet been put away.
When this happens I get angry and I feel like my family doesn’t care about me and what I want. Unchecked, I would have started yelling at my family, “Look at this, everything was perfectly clean and now it’s a disaster!” My family would have felt bad and probably felt resentful towards me for being so unreasonable. They might have cleaned up but it would have been in a very grudging way (I’m only doing this because you’re being such a total bitch and making me feel guilty).
Instead, I followed the advice in Tidying which goes “when you’re angry with other people’s messes, first clean up your mess.”
Even though I like to think I always clean up after myself, I checked and, yep, my breakfast stuff was still sitting out not yet put away. Similarly, the dining room table was covered with all kinds of work-related stuff I’d taken out for a project.
Seeing all the mess I’d left was humbling and I took care of all the stuff I’d left out and forgotten about.
By the time I’d finished, my husband was carrying a stack of his dishes into the kitchen and helped me empty the dishwasher so I could get the dirty stuff out of the sink.
This was a good lesson for me on two levels:
- It reminded me that I’m not such a paragon of neatness and that very often my irritation has more to do with my own mess than my family’s.
- To remember one of my favorite bits of advice which is before I start anything new, put away everything from the project I just completed.
- Like most people, I have a tendency to focus on what’s wrong with everyone else and think “if they would just change, I’d feel happy.” The truth is happiness begins inside and I need to first address what isn’t working within. By the time I finish addressing my own shortcomings, the outside world seems to have magically come into alignment with what I want it to be. Go figure!
###
