A Clean Home Is an Investment in Your Sanity

To finally change my messy habits, I had to scrub away my self-limiting beliefs

Shannon Ashley
Forge

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Photo: Kathrin Ziegler/Getty Images

I’I’ve been working out of my apartment since my daughter was born five years ago — but despite the amount of time I spend there each day, I never quite figured out how to, as the picture-perfect folks on HGTV say, “make my house a home.” The more I focused on building my online writing career, the more I struggled with housekeeping, eventually letting it fall by the wayside entirely.

I tried to ignore the mess. I made excuses that I was “just so busy,” that I had more important things to do, that it didn’t bother me much. But still, I constantly felt cranky and scattered.

It wasn’t until I enrolled my daughter in preschool — a transition that would require us to have actual morning and evening routines — that I finally decided to take control over my space. But I knew I couldn’t just spend one long weekend in intense Kondo mode and call my work done. I needed a sustainable plan, a system that would allow me to keep my home tidy through all the unexpected bumps, twists, and big deadlines that will inevitably come my way. Here’s what I did, and how it’s been working.

First, I got some goal coaching

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