15 minutes

I have to share this thing I’ve been doing. I’ve been cleaning and decluttering my house.  Not Marie Kondo-ing like the internet would have you believe everyone is doing. I figured out my own process.

One of the other things that I struggled with last year (and it’s only when I line them all up do I realize that I was struggling with a lot of just really low-grade anxiety that didn’t seem like much at the time, but boy it piles up, doesn’t it?) was being unable to clean/declutter my house. I had a whole list of things I wanted to do, including routine cleaning, that didn’t get done at all. I just couldn’t bring myself to do any of it. It all seemed too big. That stuff hung over me all year.

During the holidays, and even more at the start of the year, I accidentally stumbled on a thing. I just got so frustrated that I had a talk with myself:  I don’t have to do all the things. I just have to clean for 15 minutes. That’s it. Dust for 15 minutes. That’s a room or two, and then I can stop. Scrub a bathroom for 15 minutes. Then stop. Just try to do 15 minutes, every day.  Declutter a shelf.  Mop the kitchen. And so on.

Here’s what I’ve accomplished since I started doing this, less than a month ago:  I hauled to the recycling center a couple of broken electronics that had been sitting on my office floor for a year. Along with that I recycled the giant garbage sack full of plastic bags that had accumulated. I decluttered the utility closet where I had stashed everything I didn’t want to deal with since I moved into the house. I cleaned and dewaxed a half dozen candle holders that I’d stuck on a shelf intending to dewax…whenever. I rearranged my Brag Shelf so there are no longer six piles of books on my office floor. I dusted, cleaned the bathrooms, and the kitchen.

Turns out 15 minutes a day goes a long way. It’s great.  I can look at a decluttered shelf or a space of carpet that I haven’t seen in two years and it feels so good.

Let’s see if I can keep this up. I still have the craft area and fabric stash, and all the books in the basement, and the garage, and, and…