Because a house is so much more than a place to live, we describe it with the more personal word home. Home is where we meet ourselves and remind ourselves who we are and what is important to us. It tells an ever-changing story of who we are. It protects what is significant to us, our comfort, our values, and what we love. Because it reflects a sense of self, home begins within us. Because we are significant, our home is significant as well.
The creation of home that flows from who you are slowly transforms your surroundings to match who you are inside. When the structure, function, and appearance reflect accurately and gracefully who you (and your family) are, you have created a home.
Sometimes women tell me they spend a lot of time away from home because it is so messy and they don’t want to face it. Since, for a woman, the house is her larger self, this is a significant alienation from herself. But when things are going right, the heart soars.
IN THE TRENCHES WITH SMART HOMEMAKERS
Aleen to Marjorie:
Marjorie, I used to think the way you do. It was always my “house.” I found that when I started thinking of it as my “home,” my motivation went up. I got more done. I actually found myself “wanting” to clean. I also find that I am prouder of my accomplishments in the decluttering process. Now, I still often fall into the “house” terminology. Habit, familiarity of feeling, etc. causing that. So I try to keep reminding myself, this is my “home.” When I scan the cleaned areas, I think “home.” Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. “There’s no place like home.”
I think that the term “house” is like “apartment.” It implies a sense of impermanence and ownership without pride. Sort of like “my pencil,” “my shoes,” etc. So maybe if we all start thinking of our residence as a “home” rather than a “house” or “apartment” or “condo” or “trailer,” the decluttering process might become easier.
Have you ever noticed how people often name their vehicles but seldom their homes?
Love Affair with the House
Whether we like it or not, we have a love affair going with our houses. As in all intimate relationships, it is reciprocal. We shape our house as it shapes us. We lavish time, money, attention, and creativity on its development. In return, it supports and succors us. Our house provides sanctuary, pleasure, and comfort. It offers a space both for private renewal and socializing with family and friends. Our house is easy to lose this larger perspective amid the household tips, mundane chores, and just plain business.
Life Is Simple
Life is simple. But living it can become complex. Struggling to see through the complexity to the simple (to the Bare Bones, if you will), people have tried to state in a few words what is really important in life.
Which of these teachings do you most deeply buy into? Or is it another teaching? How do you view your prime directive and how are you going to live in the light of that directive? What are you going to build into it? Because you can’t do everything, you will find you need to prune out things that have crept in that do not support your real priorities.
Every person has a principle or a few principles of some kind that govern his or her life. When we state in writing what is important to us, we bring our ideas into the light so that we can strengthen and expand into a mission statement what we have chosen as our philosophy of life.
Expanding Your Vision
Let us suppose that a person of faith decides that his or her mission statement is to love and serve God, to love others, and to care for himself or herself in a responsible way. Stating his or her priorities in one sentence points the person in the direction he or she wants to go. However, one sentence is not enough to clarify how this is going to be played out in life. In the chapter on time management, we looked at how to make practical decisions in keeping with our top five priorities. These are pragmatic applications of our mission statement and may vary with different stages of life.
Here, however, let’s take a longer-range view. We may call it our lifetime vision. It is an expansion of our mission statement. A wise proverb tells us that where there is no vision, the people perish.
Perhaps the easiest way to expand your mission statement into a lifetime vision is to fast-forward and pretend you are hearing your own eulogies at your funeral from various people who are important to you in your life. No, we are not getting morbid here; it is just that this is a good way to develop a broad view of your life. Assuming you lived by your prime directive, how did you play it out, using your particular talents in your particular circumstances? As you think, or preferably write, your lifetime vision, be specific in what people in these different areas say about you. Remember, these eulogies will tell only of the things you did right, because you envision you lived out your prime directive well.
Answer the questions that apply to you:
It is not too late to make these eulogies you desire come true, not so we can brag about ourselves but so that we can live our lives to fulfill to the max the purpose for which we were put on the earth.
Veering toward Chaos
Of course, as we go about our daily activities, there will be flotsam and jetsam that call for our attention. The car breaks down. The phone service needs to be changed. A child breaks a finger. The chicken for dinner goes bad. Someone steals our identity. Everyday concerns can suck vitality from the transcendent meaning of life if we let them.
Sometimes overwhelming tragedies dwarf our best-laid plans. A hurricane, tornado, or flood sweeps into our lives. Serious illness knocks at the door or enters our lives to stay. We lose a loved one. Unspeakable loss buckles our spirit.
The well-established law of thermodynamics is always at work: Things consistently veer toward disorder and disintegration. Your job, should you choose to accept it, is to fold each one of those complexities into the overall goal and continue to refocus your life on what is important.
And how can you do that? Your spirit needs to be ready, of course. That is a given. But so do your house, your habits, and your general patterns of living. We cannot handle well the important opportunities and demands of life from a place of organizational weakness. Now is the time to get things in order and to establish patterns to your life, to build a simple grid on which the complexities can be handled.
IN THE TRENCHES WITH SMART HOMEMAKERS
From Jennifer:
Since I’ve been having some successes lately, I thought I’d share. I’m tickled pink with the improvements!
The neatest thing has been to be able to maintain a clean area once I spent a few hours on it. The kitchen is clean, dishes are washed shortly after meals, laundry is washed in a timely fashion, the stairway to the 2nd floor is cleared of “stuff,” the sofa can be used for sitting (not piles), horizontal areas are free to gather dust (not piles) if I choose to let them (!!) and etc. Maintaining takes only a fraction of the time compared with decluttering and deep-cleaning (not the dirt kind, the “stuff” kind).
This is wonderful motivation for me. It is so freeing that I have no desire to gloat about it or show it off; I am just enjoying the freedom immensely!
Fighting the Right Fight
On the news I was listening to an official of a country that has been at war for many years. The cost of war has taken a heavy toll on the citizens’ quality of life. Chronic problems continue and needs go unmet because maintaining security requires so much time and energy. Dealing with security has drained away the quality of life in that country. Education, the arts, social services, and libraries have all been neglected.
Struggling with organization will do the same to our personal lives. A life that is organized frees you up to pursue what is really important to you and to your family. Freeing yourself from the 80 percent that produces little of importance in your life will save tons of time and energy that you can then put into improving the quality of your life. Concentrating on the significant 20 percent that pays off sets your life up organizationally to do what really matters in other areas.
Look at your prime directives, the priorities that focus your life. Make them into statements. In the light of these directives, what would you do differently if you weren’t so busy and stressed? Maybe you don’t have the slightest idea because you have been so busy keeping up day-to-day living that you’ve never thought about what your priorities should be. This life is not a dress rehearsal. We don’t get another chance. It’s super-important we live this life thoughtfully and well. Don’t let the daily struggles squeeze out your ability to identify and pursue goals that give true meaning to your existence.
Bare Bones Organizing for Abundant Living
Spending less time and energy on the mechanics of living gives more time for more significant pursuits. That’s what the Bare Bones Way is all about. In keeping with her approach to life, Della applied the Bare Bones approach to the ideas she found in the Bible. She divided her life into three areas: God, others, and self.
First, she clearly defined how her commitment to God would play out in her life. At home she would spend time each day in Bible reading and prayer. She would also dedicate her home to showing hospitality as a part of reaching out to comfort and help others. She was going to attend worship services regularly at her church, become a contributing member of a small group study there, and volunteer to help with the women’s ministry. Although there was ample occasion to do much more, she felt good that she had defined her commitments and boundaries so she did not feel guilty if she refused an additional task. She knew how and why to say no.
When she thought of others, she focused on her family first and then friends. Della decided she needed to make up a three-week menu and rotate it. That way she would know the groceries to buy and the meals to prepare so that her family would be well fed.
She set up and implemented a simple schedule for the family, so the kids learned how to manage their lives and so the house was always in good condition for family time.
She had read John Wesley’s straightforward advice:
Do all the good you can,
By all the means you can,
In all the ways you can,
In all the places you can,
At all the times you can,
To all the people you can,
As long as ever you can.
Though in her heart she desired to serve others, she considered the limits of her time and energy. As a result, she decided she would serve thoughtfully, balancing it with other obligations. In other words, she would set priorities in this regard and then maintain boundaries around them.
When she turned her attention to herself—a very important part of her balanced life—she felt she should streamline her wardrobe to have only a few basics that mixed and matched. She modernized her makeup, keeping it simple, and asked her hairstylist for an easy-care (but attractive) cut. She decided to leave work on time and not bring work home. She found to her surprise that by making simple adjustments in how she functioned at work, it was possible to keep this commitment. Finally, she decided to walk in an air-conditioned mall in her neighborhood three days a week.
In short, she sharpened her focus on things that were important in her life and sought simple ways of implementing them. A lot of unimportant extras fell by the wayside. She had time to add a hobby she dearly loved—oil painting. She realized what an important part it had played in her life and how much she had missed it. The change in how her life worked was palpable. She spent less time working on the stuff of life and spent more time living it.
A small part of our time needs to be spent organizing the stage for the play we call our lives. How well you do this will determine whether you will become a woman of good intentions or a woman of influence. This book urges you to organize simply yet specifically. Then live out your life abundantly. Live it out joyfully. Don’t just leave behind general memories; leave behind a heritage. Free yourself from complexity, so you can live your life significantly. Make it truly sing.
Decision Time
What is your prime directive or mission statement?
Make it one sentence if possible.
What is your vision for your life, based on insights you had when thinking about your eulogies?
Are there any activities that need to be pruned from your life because they don’t fit your prime directive and your vision? What are they?