Works for Me Wednesday: My Secret to a Clean House

I think I may have stumbled onto something. It’s the secret to motivating myself to clean my house — or at least the main floor of it — on a regular basis. Are you ready for this?

Oh, this seems like it would simply cause me increased stress. Why would I want to invite anyone over when my living room looks like Toys ‘R Us and my bathroom has a fine layer of hair spray protecting it from the elements?

One simple reason…..

Sure, I want my home to be sparkling clean all the time. And I do my best to maintain some type of order. I want my family to feel welcome and comortable in our home. But let’s be honest here… We all kick it up a notch when we know that someone from the outside world is going to enter our domain.

I tested this theory about 10 years ago when my husband and I hosted the senior high youth Sunday school class in our living room. He was the youth pastor, we lived right across the street from the church, and there was limited classroom space. So the kids headed to our house for a cozier setting each Sunday morning. That meant that I had a specific reason for keeping the house clean and company-ready each week. It made a HUGE difference.

We’ve moved since then and don’t host a group on a regular basis, so I decided that I needed to take the same idea and make it work for this house. I simply started to invite people over for dinner. It’s always nice to have some extra time to relax with friends and family, and it’s really motivates me to do a few of the cleaning jobs that I tend to put off.

You know, it’s all a big cycle. If my house is messy, I don’t want to have anyone over. So I don’t invite anyone over, and I find myself un-motivated to do some of those little extra cleaning jobs. That means my house stays messy.

Now turn that around. If I know that someone is coming over, then I make sure my house is more orderly. Once my house is more orderly, I am more willing to invite people over. If I’m inviting people over on a regular basis, then my house stays cleaner. It’s much easier to maintain order when you haven’t let things get too bad. (Unfortunately my office space seems to be exempt from this little experiment. See HERE.)

Please don’t think I have this perfected. I’m not even close!!! But I’ve tested the theory and found that it works. I just did this recently. Our house was a little cluttery, and it was starting to bother me. But I kept finding other things that needed to be done (or at least things that I felt like doing more than I felt like cleaning). I just couldn’t get motivated. So I called my parents and invited them to dinner. It was about 2:00 when I did that, so I only had a couple of hours to get my act together. And I did. And we enjoyed a very nice evening together. And my house was cleaner by the time they got here.

Today…. my house is a disaster area really messy barely presentable. I would probably open the door if someone knocked, but I wouldn’t allow them in very far. If they tried to go upstairs, I’d probably have to tackle them to the floor. Looks like I need to invite someone over soon!

It works for me!

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