Clean in Little Steps

For a More Positive Spirit

Clean in Little Steps takes the pressure off and allows me to make progress at a more reasonable rate. Good things happen, little by little, lifting my spirit in a more positive direction.

Have you ever watched dust particles caught in a ray of light? They look like they are dancing, mini-ballerinas floating in the air. Quite beautiful, almost ethereal.

Unfortunately, they have a dark side. One dust particle floating through my life would not bother me. It’s when they join forces with grease and layer themselves on light fixtures, cabinets, shadowy counter corners, tabletops, bookshelves, and a thousand other places where I’d prefer a clean surface that they test my patience. Why can’t they just float around the great outdoors is beyond my comprehension. The grass never seems dusty. Trees are apparently immune.

A single ladybug is rather cute, something I might find in a kid’s coloring book. But when they start crawling out of the woodwork in spring, their aimless wandering is more akin to a horror movie than anything I’d want near a child. The same could be said for most bugs. Though stink bugs and centipedes have never charmed me, even as individuals.

I could talk about rust, grime, the bag of unmatched socks that hangs in the closet, items shoved to the very back of cabinets, and broken bits of this and that, which, if the right glue were applied, might make sense to keep, or a hundred other housekeeping chores that haunt me to varying degrees throughout the seasons.

After years of attempting to keep everything neat and clean, only to discover that dust bunnies had hatched an army under my bed, I went through a stage of surrender. Some might have called it defeat. I shielded myself with the reasoning that clutter had its own native beauty, and there was no use fraying what was left of my nerves over an endless battle I could never win. Dust bunnies would always sneak back in when I wasn’t looking.

Then, as the new year rolled around, I battled fatigue, nebulous conjectures about world events, and too many tasks to accomplish in too little time, the lyrics to a song I heard years ago rang in my head: “Do few things but do them well.”

My brain nearly exploded. That won’t work! Rust moves too fast! Grease flies. Dust swirls out of control. Pictures tilt. Stuff breaks. A neat and clean home is pure fantasy. Maybe when we have cleaning bots working 24/7… but then I imagine robot parts rusting, falling apart, adding to the clutter.

So, I tried an experiment. I wrote on my calendar for each day of the week, Monday through Friday: “Clean in Little Steps.” The first day, I cleaned half the kitchen counter. The next day, I was in a drawer mood, so I wiped and organized two drawers. Mid-week, I got adventurous and scrubbed the stove top. Just the top. Next, the refrigerator shelves. Finally, the last dark corners of the counter. By the weekend, I could see a difference. My kids saw a difference.

The biggest difference was in my mood – about EVERYTHING.

Three months have passed, and I am amazed at how much I have accomplished. I even traipsed to the great outdoors, piled up some clutter, and found a guy at a recycling place who collects old metal, wires, and plastics. He’s now on my favorites list.

I have gone through cleaning frenzies before, and by the second week, I am a bigger wreck than the house ever was. The avalanche of energy never lasts.

This time, I don’t make cleaning a major part of the day. And I don’t tell myself what I must do ahead of time. I just pick one small thing and do it; however, whenever the mood hits me—I clean in little steps. Polish one window. Scrub a toilet. Attack and wrangle into submission whatever is under my bed.

Is the whole house clean? No. Don’t be silly. I’m not a miracle worker. Does dust keep falling and grease keep accumulating, and yucky stuff still happen? Yes. But I no longer feel like a hapless victim. I pick my battles. Some days I can swipe out a whole refrigerator. Other days, I’m lucky if I get the dishes done.

But a more honest acceptance of my life has helped my mood in ways I didn’t predict. I won’t get everything done. My house will never be ready for a magazine photoshoot. But I am not defeated.

There is so much in life that is beyond my control, I could spend my waking days in a nightmare of what-ifs and grieving over things much worse than grime. Bad things occur. Degradation happens—all the time.

But I can do one good thing each day. And that matters. Because daring to care, to try to improve something—anything—makes the whole world better.

Living in hope doesn’t mean accomplishing a to-do list or saving the human race from madness. It just means trying to do one good thing today. Little by little. And some days, the dust particles aren’t the only ones dancing.