My husband Tom tends to do this thing where he re-tells me stories over and over again and as he tells them more details seem to drip out until he realizes there was some big hidden AHA moment within these stories all along.
Now, it’s hard to use any of these as examples, because the truth is…they’re all pretty shocking, so I’m just going to make one up so you can get what I’m talking about.
Say Tom repeatedly told me this story about how his dad used to take him driving in his Corvette all the time. For years, I listened to my sweet husband regale me with stories about how he would cruise the streets with his dad, and how he always got to ride with the top down.
Picture him telling me, “My dad and I would drive up and down the street, with the windows down, playing Guns and Roses the whole way!”
I smile and listen on, allowing him to relive this core moment in his life.
“Yeah, he surprised me with the car one day when we were out walking. He ran into the liquor store quickly and came out running with the keys in his hand. He yelled for me to jump in as fast as I could and told me never to look back…then the liquor store clerk ran out after us to…”
This is usually the part of his stories where he sees my facial expression and the AHA moment hits.
Yeah, your dad stole a car.
NOW, before we continue, let me be clear, Tom’s dad never once stole any car…that we’re aware of.
I’m merely using this example to make a point that Tom repeatedly regails me with these core memory stores that have a plot twist even he didn’t see coming. While this shocking story isn’t one of the, trust me the real life plot twists are always as shocking.
I tell you this because a lot of times our struggles, setbacks and bad habits might be really obvious to on-lookers, but are not always obvious to us.
Plot twist and dirty dishes
For example, I used to do a few big declutter sessions per year only to realize that if I was always decluttering, I wasn’t actually getting anywhere. Plot twist.
I heard a story about a woman who was always overwhelmed by the amount of dishes she owned. Without fail, her sink would fill up, her countertops would become covered and the dishes would go unwashed so long that her cupboards were empty and the dirty dishes were stuck to her countertops.
Finally, she had no choice but to give in and do the dishes which was always a daunting task. The solution? Own fewer dishes.
If her dishes piled up until there were none left in the cupboard, all she needed to do to lighten her dishes workload was to own less dishes to begin with. Plot twist.
This is where we run into problems a lot of times – we are going through life unaware of our own plot twists.
Take the pin out
The reality is things don’t have to be as difficult as we imagine they have to be.
After each massive declutter session I would go though, I would pat myself on the back, congratulating myself on the sweat equity I had put in and the hours of hard work I had accomplished. In reality, I could have avoided the over-accumulation of stuff if I simply bought less stuff.
The woman could have avoided these long dishwashing sessions by simply owning fewer dishes.
It reminds me of a parable I heard told by Wayne Dyer about a person walking around with a thumbtack in their pocket that was stuck in their thigh.
The person continued to walk around with the thumb tack in their leg while complaining to everyone about the pain they were in. They took pain killers to dull the pain, but the thumb tack stayed in so long they began to walk with a limp. Whenever anyone asked, they would go on and on about the pain this pin was causing them until one day someone said, “Why don’t you take the pin out?” Plot twist!
What’s your plot twist?
If you find yourself overwhelmed by the stuff in your house, drowning in clutter, or stressed out over the workload you are carrying around your house, can I ask you, what’s the plot twist?
Now, a lot of times we don’t want to acknowledge our own plot twists because we would have to accept that we very well may be our own problem, but remember the only way to make lasting change is to start showing up differently. Take out the pin.
Are you in the Clutter Cycle like I once was? Does it seem like no matter how much you declutter you KEEP having to declutter?
If so, what’s the pin? Where’s the source? What is it that keeps coming into your house that is keeping you stuck in this cycle?
Can you cut it off at the source?
For example, I used to be overwhelmed by my kids' toys. I think most parents can relate. I would read ideas online like toy cycling and better organized bins.
When I taught preschool we had bins for all the toys and each bin had a picture label so the kids knew where to put each toy back. It was a perfect system…for a preschool.
I tried implementing this at home and the only way it worked was if I put myself into the role of toy cleaning dictator who oversaw the toy tidying on a nearly hourly basis.
Toy cycling wasn’t great because I would forget to cycle and my kids seemed to ask for new toys during those times when I was too busy to go into dictator mode, so I would just take down another bin without clearing away the first one so that I could get back to work, or cooking, or whatever it was I was doing at the time.
What did work?
Giant, ugly bins. Those big 10 gallon bucket sized bins that work best for outdoor soccer balls. I bought 3. At the end of the day, all the toys needed to be back in the bins. I didn’t care where, I didn’t care how (as long as it wasn’t me), I just needed it done so I could see the floors in my home again.
The plot twist was that I needed to stop trying to make organizing chaos aesthetically pleasing and needed to be more realistic about what I was actually capable of managing in a day.
Did my toy bins looks as cute, pretty, or organized as all those moms on Pinterest? Nope. That was something I had to let go of too.
Take the time to go through your worksheet and your home today and ask yourself, “Where are my plot twists?”
What are the biggest areas of frustration in your home? What would managing those things look like if it were easy.
Here’s a hint, making things easier doesn’t look like:
* Coming up with a color coded organization system
* Heading to Target to buy bins, tools and label makers
* Freaking out and screaming at everyone in your house (trust me, if this worked, my life would be running so smooth, I wouldn’t have to worry about covering the gray hairs that consume my head.)
Embrace easy
If you want life to feel easier, work to embrace easy. This goes against everything we’ve ever been taught.
We would love to believe that the more sweat, work and perfection we can put into things, the more worthy we are.
Let me challenge you in this mindset, and remind you that those are nonsense rules that have been handed down to us by people who are overwhelmed and overworked. If you don’t want to follow in their footsteps, take the time to consider that life could actually be easy.
Declutter Prompt
Don’t worry about decluttering so much as finding a simple solution to an area of frustration in your home. Remember, sometimes we are too close to our own picture. Just like Tom didn’t see the plot twist in his stories until he re-told them to me multiple times, sometimes we need to talk it out with another person or even ourselves. Never underestimate the power of talking to yourself – I do it all the time. This might require you eliminating some things, but it might be as simple as making a single small shift in your mindset!