And.. In a laid back, realistic, practical sort of way.
My nostalgia series continue. Back in the day, -that’s right I’ve said it- there were schools for women that taught them how to take care of their home in a well thought out, systematic way. All the little details we all have to discover by trial and error today were already carefully and diligently mapped out. We can still find the remnants of these body of works as books online. Here is one:
PRACTICAL HOMEMAKING, A Textbook for Young Housekeepers by Mabel Hyde Kittredge, 1914.
These most helpful schools and resources evolved into Home Economics classes in a way and then slowly faded away. Why? That’s another topic altogether and unfortunately involves too many dark aspects to handle, for me, so I’ll leave it aside for now by quoting the first sentence of this book by Ms. Kittredge herself:
“What you would have appear in the life of people that you must put into the schools”.
Mabel Hyde KITTREDGE,1914
If that is not the case for the school systems in most of our countries, it is a quite straightforward inference that the main purpose of the schools at the moment are not to provide the necessary skill set for our survival and having a better quality of life.
Back to the book itself; it is impossible not to appreciate the level of determination and interest the author had taken in creating an A to Z approach and explaining, say, how to throw out the trash in New York city tenements and what happens to them afterwards, how the trashes are being collected, dumped, transported by the city and finally ends up becoming a surprise item on the other side of the ocean, (spoiler alert: soap), completing their whole lifecycle.
Painting such a wholesome picture on our daily consumption would prevent polluting the Earth as we are doing today, and be definitely a more mindful approach regarding the consequences of our daily actions. The science and reasoning behind the advice and guidelines are always provided in the book and the reader feels more mindful and in control of their lives immediately, understanding these most common bits in our lives that we never stop to think for a moment, and as a consequence, making us understand life itself, step by step.
The book was published in 1914, right around the time where the madness began and the Earth started closing on itself witnessing a most terrible war, which would be followed by another in the aftermath of the first one. Millions of lives would be lost, economies would collapse and the landscape and the fabric of society would never be the same again. But people remain, and despite all our arrogance, our simple and unimportant lives revolve around our basic needs, which are pretty universal.
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The archaic outlook to label and categorize things, people, life, in order to ensure the continuation of a defined and predictable environment created the need for these educations, partly. Women do this and men do that and things are done this way to be effective etc. was the natural consequence of that outlook towards life. These types of strict should’s and must’s probably cannot find a place in our culturally and socially diverse society anymore, people will naturally rebel against them. But it cannot be denied, that these types of “guides” provide some insights that fill certain psychological and practical gaps in the lives of people by enhancing their personal skill sets.
Take Marie Kondo. She took over the world to fill the gap in home care and we appreciate her for it. Her joy sparking, color coding, apparel folding KonMari techniques, adapted to the reality of the struggles of our modern lives filled the need for that structured home environment that we were at a loss on how to create and manage, so the entire world went crazy all of a sudden and started decluttering their homes in her specific manner.
Indeed, after all, it turns out there was a need for learning how to take care of our homes and create a more structured and predictable environment to feel secure at our homes and in consequence, our lives-apparently.
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That being said, I think we can all agree, one size does not fit the entire world.
Here are my couple of tips that I’ve discovered over the years that has helped me. I am no Marie Kondo, in fact I am along with my home a mess at times, but I hope they help you. My viewpoint is that if I can do them, probably most people could as well.
The Method.
Procrastination is the obstacle to getting things done. It is like a friction force in physics. You need a bit of a push and then it is a smooth ride.
- Do it now.
If it is something you can do immediately and you’re not in the middle of an important task, do it now. If there is an impediment (time, resources, people), write it on a to-do list and make a plan for removing the impediment & doing it.
- Make it smaller.
Divide and conquer. Do the vacuuming today for 15 minutes. Clean the bathroom for 15 minutes tomorrow.
Say you need to hang a new clock you’ve bought. It requires multiple steps so you keep on procrastinating. Write all the impediments, “Buy batteries, nails/ hangers etc. ” and do them one by one. Finally your list will only have “Hang the clock” so it will be an easier job. Buy the batteries today, hang the clock tomorrow.
- Ask yourself “Why?”
If you keep on procrastinating an easy job, perhaps you are avoiding it for a reason, subconsciously. Ask yourself quietly and you’ll get an answer. Most likely, it is related to how it will make you feel.
Planning tools and reminders keep us on track.
- The shopping list.
A shopping list on the refrigerator or a wall in the kitchen/entryway is a must. The reason being, the highest turnover are on the perishables or cleaning products at home and those are usually in the kitchen or bathroom. Keep it where you will toss the old item, and write on the list immediately as soon as the item hits the trash can. Clock is not working, batteries are dead, so throw them away and write “batteries” on your Shopping List.
- Have a reminder set-up.
I also have a list of to-do’s on the fridge. Dog’s medicine, check. Pay the electricity bill, check. It’s just easier for me, because let’s face it, I spend waay too much time around the fridge.
- Calendar
Yep, again, on the fridge. Some people have magnets, I use it as a board basically. I print 3 months, each on a sheet, I mark appointments, birthdays and all sort’s of to-do’s. The current one is always on the front and these sheets are held via magnets.
I’ve got one design I really like and this website I’ve used is a calendar template heaven.
Systems conserve energy.
- Keeping things where they are used makes tasks intuitive.
Keep sheets of bedding in those respective rooms, keep hand and bath towels in the bathroom, keep kitchen towels in the kitchen. Keep things where the activity is. This means the distribution will be done after the laundry and not each time you need an item, which will save you lots of trips in the meantime.
- Optimize-always.
If you are doing it a second time, and will do again, then you should create a system. If you take your trash out of the bin and then look for the trash bag inside the drawers every time, here is a tip: Toss the trash bag roll inside the bin and then line the bin with the new bag. This way every time you take out the bag, you’ll see the roll immediately underneath the bag. This sort of a thing is what I am talking about.
- Clutter is a clue.
Another clue for the need for optimization is the clutter. If clutter keeps accumulating somewhere, then there is a need to create a system and the items should have their own places accordingly. Or at least a basket to chuck them for now and take them to their places afterwards. There is an energy flow at home and once you follow it, your systems become quite intuitive.
Final Tip
- If you need more than one plastic bin for the same type of items, you need less items.
I’m sorry about this, but we have way too many things in modern society. Our ancestors did not drop dead for lack of a waffle iron. If you have less things, then you’ll have less home organization to do and more watching TV or reading or whatever. And by less I mean the amount that you feel satisfied and not deprived for any task/event, and not overwhelmed by choice; that is the golden ratio of items for that specific task/event. I’ll share another post on decluttering over time, because when it comes to tossing things out, I’m faint of heart.
These are my small pearls of wisdom. Hope it helps.
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