Which house chore is your favorite? Mine are vacuuming and cleaning the dishes in the sink. I even enjoy “the noise” crumbles make as they go up in the vacuum cleaner. What is the benefit of enjoying chores? A new study finds that kids learning to do chores at an early age like kindergarten have a more successful life. This could be one of the most beneficial studies for parents. I keep telling my kids: “If you want to be successful in life, you gotta pick up some chores.”
Any repeated task without a rationale is bound to become boring or even unbearable. House chores are no exception to this. Many stay at home parents spend an entire day working on chores only to be accused of doing nothing at the end of the day. I remember my mom complaining about this all the time. What type of mindset can help us weave chores into our life with meaning and compassion? Some realities maybe. We have to eat, therefore we need to cook, and viola we have dishes and crumbles. Since we cannot escape from this reality, how about we embrace it?
This is no where near to say that my house is spotless. My house is actually very messy. Right now I have about 40 Ninja books on the floor. We all managed to eat lunch but the table is not cleaned up yet. The girls had to go to their gymnastics lesson and I am now settling down after groceries and cooking. If someone out there is busy making some useful robots for daily chores, maybe it will help if they make it quick. 🙏 My poor Dyson is broken now and I am scared to look at the prices. 😬
I am looking forward to going back to work this week after an extended winter break due to water restrictions in Richmond. This is another example of perspective shift; where I now accept work as a place to rest. Thinking about the endpoint (my futuristic personality) that an empty shining sink is the best sink and a floor without crumbles is the best to step on, I will continue working on my chores with some pleasure.
I thought of an old friend Althea Merrick as I wrote this. Once she told me putting ice into the disposal will sharpen the blades. I just put some snow down. May Althea rest in peace. At some point I wrote a cookbook. Why is cooking not making the favorites list? In our house my husband is the one who is "faster at cooking fast food"- making a tornado mess- to settle the kids down. I enjoy baking and cooking things that no one will eat. That also pushed me into the cleaner position.
I just picked up the Ninja books from the floor, yes I have 40 of them!
I hope you resonate with some of my self talk 💐
Comments