Raise your hand if you often feel like ‘To-Dos’ are an inconvenience. I admit, sometimes, well ok, a lot of the time, things that need to be done feel like an inconvenience. Some of these things are – returning things to the store, putting things away after I’ve used them, stopping at the store for a single thing, switching over laundry, signing the kids up for sports, and the list goes on and on and on. I’ve been in this mindset for, well, a long time. After I had kids, the to-dos that were ‘inconvenient’ grew exponentially (sigh).
I consider to-dos ‘inconvenient’ for several reasons. I always, I mean always, have other things I would rather be doing. I’m interested in a lot of things so naturally I tend to have a lot on my mind. I like to DIY, so I keep a list and a box of projects I want to do around our house. For example, our 2-seater outdoor table and chairs desperately needs attention. And if I’m being honest, I suppose the larger table and chairs does too. Instead of throwing it away, I love the idea of cleaning it up, painting it, and making it like new. Another project waiting on my attention is a shadow box of memorabilia from my 2 half-marathons. I want to put the pictures in with the medals and make it look nice and hang the box somewhere to celebrate those accomplishments. I also tend to look at many of my to-dos as an inconvenience because, let’s face it, they’re things I really don’t want to do. It’s not like I see a blank white envelope addressed to me with my name incorrectly spelled and think, “Oh, this is going to be important. I need to open it right now!” A third big reason these things are inconvenient is because I tend to think I have less time than I actually do, and I’m eager and anxious to get to the next thing. For example, this morning I brought down the master bathroom trash can to empty. After I emptied it, I was seriously tempted to leave it on the stairs and take it up ‘later, when I have more time.’ But I realized, I had nothing urgent to do, and it would most definitely be there until I brought it back to where it belonged, (aka no one else was going to put it away) so why not just do it now? It takes one minute to put it back. Am I really that busy that I don’t have one minute to put it away? Of course not, but my brain tells me I need to move to the next to-do as quickly as possible. The last reason to-dos become inconvenient is because my brain tells me I must do things a very specific way, which is usually more complicated than it needs to be, so I put it off until I can do it ‘the right way’. And so, it sits.
I’m working on reprogramming my brain. One of my overarching goals is to keep my home clutter-free. This ‘why’ directs my behavior. Physical clutter causes bad things to happen in my brain, causing mental clutter. Mental clutter causes me to think less clearly and be more anxious. I combat this in several ways. First, I have to minimize anything coming into my home that my family doesn’t absolutely need, or something that I really, really, really want. Buying something that we ‘might’ need is a behavior I need to stop. If we’re living without it now, odds are we can continue to live without it for a while longer. I remind myself of my goal of living clutter-free. Second, doing things now versus later allows my future self to spend time working on my DIY projects. Or, at least I may be able to set aside the to-dos for a while every so often to work on projects because there’s less clutter needing tending. Leaving things undone leads to more clutter, which leads to a bad cycle. I must stop that cycle. Third, I’m changing my mindset to allow myself to put things away in the best way I can now instead of waiting for the ‘right’ way to do it. I remind myself that putting something away, even in the ‘wrong’ way, still moves me closer to my goal of living clutter-free.
They say it takes 3 weeks to build a habit. Whether or not that’s true, I know it will take time to reprogram my brain against my natural tendencies. I’ll probably battle for the rest of my life. I know I’ll suffer setbacks, so I’ll go easy on myself when that happens. I’ll make adjustments on the way as I learn. After all, it’s a journey, not a destination.
