Ongoing, low pressure: cleaning living space early this summer.

[oak]

Friends, in the next six weeks, before July 4 let's say, I'd like to clean/declutter/purify my following living spaces, with what I do in each:

1. Desk: WFH and self-taught professional skills (eg tech).
2. Home dojo: tai chi, kettlebell, dynamic stretches.
3. Stove.

These are where I think, move, and renew myself. All worthy goals.

The bedroom, bathroom, and TV area will have to wait. (Old Me "reasoned" that if everything isn't perfect right now, then I am justified in doing nothing forever. I don't want to be That Guy anymore.)

I always like to start with quick victories, so my goal this week is to declutter and clean the home dojo. I anticipate this will take twenty minutes.

Also, today, I'll go to the dollar store for trash bags and disinfectant wipes.

Thanks for joining me on this low-key, happy summer journey!

[Mental Fairy]

Oh Oak, ya getting me all excited. I love clearing space. New progress for you my dear. Nothing more cleansing than a clean out.
Remove what doesn’t serve and keep what ya need.

One room at a time and work away at it with an open mind. Super excited to hear how you go with this project.
Kind of like nesting.

[oak]

Remove what doesn’t serve and keep what ya need.

Word. I created space:

MentalFairy, your encouragement motivated me to stand up, and begin cleaning. After a good day I was wracked with grief and couldn't move, until I read your kind post, and began to eye the dojo space.

I don’t like the word “purifying”, but there it is.

I began by defining my terms: my home dojo is the (fake) wooden linoleum up to the carpet. Anything past that I ignored.

Then, I began decluttering by category: clean clothes, then non-fitness stuff, then trash. I vacuumed.

All the while I listened to my second favorite album of all time, BNL’s Rock Spectacle. It sounds just as fresh as it did 25 years ago, when I repeatedly listened to it as a drunken college dropout. (Happily I’m sober and graduated for many years now: combined, 36 years!)

While the desk and stove will have to wait for another day, this is what my recovery looks like: we stuck together, defined our terms, kept the goal in mind, and eased our burdens along the way with music. I am a success today. We did it together.

[Mental Fairy]

Oak you make me feel like a proud mum!!!

I don’t like the term purification of rooms as we all need reminding nothing is perfect! There is no such thing.

Your rooms represent what they are used for. They have doors for a reason.
With the kitchen if you need to attack the oven I was taught by my gran to take the steel trays and wrap in tin foil then place in bathtub covered with hot water and a cup of washing powder you use in washing machine, or two dishwasher tablets. Leave overnight. The chemical combination will make them easy to clean as they react with the tin foil.
Works like a dream with pots and BBQ stuff too.

To get amazing clean on toilet bowl use denture cleaning tablets. Leave in bowl. Scrub and flush!

[Mental Fairy]

May I also add that you need music while cleaning. Please look up six60 song, someone to be around or……don’t forget your roots. Meaning you ancestry. That is my gift to you while you clean. Especially the six60 song somewhere to be around.

[oak]

Please look up six60 song, someone to be around or……don’t forget your roots.

Mental Fairy! Thank you for the recommendation. I enjoyed both songs: I’ve always liked soul/pop. They reminded me a bit of the Black Pumas:

https://youtu.be/0G383538qzQ

Well friends, after a terrifying counseling session, where I found myself involuntary instantly expressing rage while role playing, ostensibly to poke fun at my family of origin, I found myself unburdened.

I started looking at the revolting stove top, then the two tubs of disinfectant wipes I got at the dollar store. Yes, it took 70 wipes to get it from revolting to simply messy.

Then I saw the clothes laying around, and groceries that needed to be put away. I’m happy to say that both situations are much improved.

Lesson I took away: rage and healing are two sides of the same coin.

[manuel_moe_g]

rage and healing are two sides of the same coin.

Great stuff!

[Mental Fairy]

So proud of you Oak.
Lemon juice on water or baking soda in white vinegar is the trick to all mess.

[oak]

Bees!

Or maybe they’re wasps or hornets.

Whatever they are, they are trickling into my apartment.

My clean apartment, that is.

I’d have had major mess-shame if this happened six weeks ago. Now I’m cool with alerting the apartment manager to come when they reopen Monday. This would have been an embarrassing nightmare (the maintenance person wading through my clutter) had I not taken action.

While this little vignette is good on its own terms, the meta lesson: there are things we can do today that are easy/free/quick now that may someday soon prove to be difficult/expensive/time-consuming.

Will we take action while we can?

[manuel_moe_g]

there are things we can do today that are easy/free/quick now that may someday soon prove to be difficult/expensive/time-consuming.

I hear you. I am so bad at doing the "Important, but not Urgent", that critical quadrant on the Eisenhower Matrix

https://todoist.com/productivity-methods/eisenhower-matrix

I will make a plan, wish me luck, there are many things I can identify as "Important, but not Urgent" but if I don't do them, they will eventually become "Important & Urgent & Costly & Time-Consuming"!