Managing Your Life

Today I went to hear a speaker at our church. I did not know what topic she was going to be speaking about. I just knew that she's been on Oprah and everyone said I needed to hear her speak. I am really not one to give into peer pressure. But, Oprah is Oprah. Enough said...

At any rate, I found myself in a room full of young moms of preschool children. I am not going to mention the speaker's name because it is irrelevant. But, she was speaking on the topic of managing your household. Now, since my daughter has gone off to college, my household consists of me...which means I can pretty much do what I want when I want to do it! Yes, that aspect of the "empty nest syndrome" has been liberating. My point is that her topic didn't really pertain to me. But, I listened because a)if it helps my preschool moms, it helps me and b)for goodness sake, the lady has been on Oprah!

The speaker really had some good points. One of them was that your husband and children really have absolutely no clue what it takes to keep your household up and running. Therefore, it is your job to tell them. You can even go on her website and print out the list of all the stuff that has to be done to run your household. This way you can show your family and have proof. Then, you have to work on "team building" with your family to get them to help you accomplish all those things on the list. Secondly, she said it is important to make your house a home. It doesn't have to be perfectly clean and beautiful all the time. And, if you are obsessed with making it clean and beautiful all the time, then you are probably pretty much making your family miserable. I have seen this first hand. My sister-in-law used to vacuum two or three times a day. She would mop, dust, clean toilets, do laundry, and make a home cooked meal every single day. She was really subconsciously making herself miserable. And, her family was feeling tortured by her demands. No one in the house was happy. I don't know what happened. But, she has lightened up so much over the years. The sad thing is that she missed out on making a lot of memories with her children because she was too busy vacuuming. Some lessons are learned the hard way.

Anyway, as I was listening to this speaker, I was thinking about our studies about women. Yes, we are expected to be it all, do it all, and have it all. In theory it is nice to think that our children and husbands would just love to jump in there and happily help us out with everything! Unfortunately, that is not how our society programs our genders. Women still do most of the domestic work even if they work outside the home. Most women I have talked to say that it is easier to do it themselves then have to nag their family to help them.

Kudos to this speaker for trying to get us to all take steps in having a more equally balanced home. I'm all about people feeling more in control of their lives so they can have time to stop and enjoy it all! So, ladies, put up those vacuum cleaners and do something fun!