Latest / The Christian Homemaking Podcast: Simply Convivial with Mystie Winckler / What I Do When My House Is Messy and I’m So Tired

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What I Do When My House Is Messy and I’m So Tired · The Christian Homemaking Podcast: Simply Convivial with Mystie Winckler

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  If you're exhausted and overwhelmed with homemaking, then this right here could
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  be just the thing to help you fix it What do you do when your house is messy
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  and you have no motivation left for cleaning, especially because you've been
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  busy all day and you're just so tired?
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  Will a better cleaning routine save you?
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  Probably not, because you've tried that already.
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  Believe me, you are not the only one.
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  I hear this all the time from my listeners, and I
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  feel this one often myself.
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  Sometimes the mess just feels like too much.
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  That's reality.
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  A few days ago, I got an email from a listener named Caitlin.
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  She said that she often hears herself in her own head telling
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  herself, "See this mess?
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  The messy house means that you are a failure.
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  You're irresponsible with everything, and you don't even deserve to
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  have what you have because you don't take care of any of it."
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  Now, if you relate to that story, if you've ever heard that story
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  playing in your own head, hit the like button and then look and see
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  that you are not the only one.
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  I have so been there myself before too.
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  But
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  Neither you nor I needs to stay stuck listening to that lie
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  that we beat ourselves up with.
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  It's not working.
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  It's not motivating us, and I have some solutions that will work.
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  I'm Misty Winkler, homemaker of 25-plus years, homeschool mom of
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  five, grandma, and author of the book Home is for Hospitality: Why
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  Your Home and Homemaking Matter.
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  I wanna help you manage your home and life cheerfully and competently so that what
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  you do and how you do it glorifies God.
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  If that kind of encouragement sounds up your alley, then hit the subscribe
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  button because every weekday for Organize October, I'm gonna have new
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  episodes on organizing our attitudes.
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  Grab a basket of laundry to fold, and let's talk about how to replace
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  that lie in our heads and how to get started seeing progress even when the
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  house is messy and you're exhausted.
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  So we're starting from the point of recognizing that the house is a
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  mess And it's true that sometimes the house is a mess because
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  we haven't been doing our job.
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  Maybe we let the mess build up and we should have been cleaning, but we weren't.
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  But just because the house is messy doesn't necessarily mean
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  we've done anything wrong.
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  The house being a mess is not a point of failure.
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  It is our job Life produces mess.
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  People living in a space will generate a mess.
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  The fact that there is a mess isn't a problem
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  It's just the next thing that we need to do.
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  But often, somehow we get it in our heads, usually without even realizing
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  it, thinking that the perfect cleaning routine Or the right set of habits
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  for us or for our children will mean that the house is never messy again.
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  And so we clean, we find cleaning schedules, we pick habits to work
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  on towards the goal of having a house that's never messy.
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  And when that doesn't happen, when our house becomes a mess, that we
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  interpret that as a sign of failure because we thought that our goal
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  was having a never messy house.
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  But that shouldn't have been the goal at all.
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  Our goal needs to be faithfully taking the next step in front of us.
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  And so if the house is messy, that's just the next step.
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  Most Mondays our house is very messy because we don't really
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  worry about it on Sunday.
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  And even with only four people living in our house right now, it is a small rental,
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  so it's a small space and four people And four full-size people can actually
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  make a lot of mess even in just one day.
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  So the mess on Monday morning isn't a sign of failure at all.
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  It's a sign that we took a day of rest, and that today's job is to clean up.
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  And it's really not that big of a deal if we tackle it cheerfully instead
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  of making it mean something that it doesn't mean When we can look at the
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  mess and see the life that was lived, and this is the evidence of that life,
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  it's the effect of a full busy life being lived, then we can be grateful
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  for the people and the situation and the activities and the growth and the
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  busyness that then resulted in the mess.
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  And then we can take care of it because managing the home, managing that space,
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  and taking care of things is our job.
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  So it's good to have a job.
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  Everyone still needs us.
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  W- And they need us to help them learn how to take care of mess as well.
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  It's not like we have to be the maid cleaning up after everyone.
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  But it is our job to manage our space well.
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  Not to make it look like our space has never been lived in or never touched.
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  But yes, the job of a homemaker involves a lot of moving stuff around day after day.
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  You move the dirty laundry to the laundry room.
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  You move the clean laundry to the bedrooms to put the stuff away.
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  You clear the table again and again and again.
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  You take the dirty dishes to the sink and put the clean dishes away.
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  Moving stuff around our house is a large part of homemaking.
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  That's not meaningless That's not a problem.
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  It's not depressing
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  It's just management.
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  That's the kind of job that we have.
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  We have a caretaking management job, and we can learn to do it well and cheerfully
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  So that's the mindset attitude piece.
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  But then we are left with the actual messy space, and we don't feel like
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  we have the energy to deal with it.
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  We're tired, exhausted, and probably a big part of that exhaustion is
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  coming from feeling depleted of energy because of the negative story
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  that we're spinning about the job.
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  Telling ourselves that we are a failure because there's a mess is a surefire way
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  to kill motivation to actually work on it
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  Listening to lies is exhausting.
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  Telling ourself the truth, working from gratitude is motivating
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  So here's my practical solution for you if the house is messy and you feel exhausted.
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  You start with a timer.
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  This is the best smile and start habit.
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  Inside Convivial Circle, we call it the transformation 10.
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  Pick one area, any area in your house that really is bugging you for any reason.
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  Take a timer, set it for 10 minutes.
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  Spend 10 minutes making that one spot better.
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  Then you stop when the timer goes off, and you notice the progress that you made.
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  Now, notice some of the words that I said as I explained this to you.
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  I did not say fix it.
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  I did not even say clean it or declutter it, and I definitely did
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  not say finish or organize that space.
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  Whatever the space is, it might need some cleaning, it might need some
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  decluttering, it might need some organizing, but you're going to just
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  spend 10 minutes focused in on making it better And when you do that, you will
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  naturally choose the actions that will give you the biggest bang for your buck
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  Because you're spending 10 minutes only and you're not worried about finishing,
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  you're not worried about an end result, you will naturally choose to do the
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  things that will have the biggest impact
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  You'll throw away the trash.
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  You'll, you'll do the easy things that make a big difference
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  And in 10 minutes, you really can make, you really can make that space so
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  much better than you thought possible
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  And then when you stop and notice and see for yourself 10 minutes made
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  a difference, you made a difference in that space That's motivating.
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  Now you're reinforcing a true narrative, which is that you are a homemaker.
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  You are someone who can spend time and get something done
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  Maybe you didn't finish it, maybe it's not done done, but you did do something.
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  Which is the opposite story of telling yourself that you're
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  a failure who is irresponsible and can't take care of anything.
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  If you tell yourself that story, your brain will then notice any details
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  that will back up that story And you will start to live in a way that
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  reinforces that story because you don't want to acknowledge that you're lying
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  But it is a lie.
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  So instead, make a difference in one small spot for 10 minutes, and then
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  tell yourself, notice and tell yourself that you are the kind of person who
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  can see something that bothers you and make a difference in only 10 minutes.
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  You will start noticing more areas that bug you, but you'll start taking
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  But you'll start just making it a little bit better, even if it's only three
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  minutes, five minutes, 10 minutes.
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  You can do a little something and make it better.
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  You're the kind of person that makes everywhere you go a little bit better.
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  That's a completely different story
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  But it's true.
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  That's the way God made us to be.
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  He made us to take dominion.
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  He made us to work.
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  And so when we work and we notice that we have an effect on our
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  surroundings, that we can tend and take care of our place, and it makes
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  a difference we start reinforcing that story with our actions more and more
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  It matters what you tell yourself about yourself and about your life
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  and your home and your situation.
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  It matters what you pay attention to in your life.
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  Your home is not a trophy that other people are smudging.
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  Your home is not a trophy that's supposed to be untouched up high on a shelf.
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  Your home is a stage, and you're the stage manager.
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  Life is happening on that stage, and every once in a while, it needs a scene reset.
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  That's fine.
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  That's your job.
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  You can do that.
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  It's doing its job when the props are scattered everywhere
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  at the end of the scene.
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  That's no problem.
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  They need to be moved.
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  They need to be swapped, and then we're ready for the next scene of
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  life You're not setting up a dollhouse that your toddler has toppled over
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  Watch your analogies, watch your stories, and stay tuned for
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  tomorrow's Organize October episode