Reframing How You Think About Stuff *Part 1-Acceptance of Doing It Crappy

I don’t fold my underwear. I thought about adding a picture of my underwear drawer to this post, but only for a second. This might seem like a weird thing to share with the world so WHY am I telling you this?

Well - a lot of my mission with helping you declutter, teaching you how to declutter on your own, and helping you manage your house chaos in general, is to REFRAME THE WAY YOU THINK about your stuff.

Which is where the unfolded underwear comes in.

Listen - I am a Virgo and an absolute perfectionist who is learning the art of ‘let it go’ when it comes to perfection. My girls are 19 and 17 now, but when they were tiny little princesses, I folded their little clothes perfectly: shirts, pants, pj’s, undies - all perfectly organized in the correct section of the drawer. I matched up all their little socks perfectly and God help us all if a sock was missing.

Don’t get me started on toys with a bajillion pieces. Why do those even exist?

I was a STAY HOME MOM - the grandest or most torturous role on the planet depending on whom you ask. But I COULD spend/waste my life hyper-managing tiny clothes and pieces of toys. (I take medication now. JK - kind of. I do take medication, but that doesn’t necessarily have to be the solution.)

I was helping a friend in her house a few months ago. She has ADHD, her husband has ADHD, and she would readily admit she feels like she’s drowning in her house most of the time. She’s trapped in the continuous never-ending laundry cycle so many people are in: baskets of dirty laundry, baskets of clean laundry, loads in front of the washing machine, one load in the machine that sits too long and just gets rewashed, etc., etc.

I said, “Why don’t we just put the kids’ clothes in their drawers? Just throw them in there. They don’t have to be perfectly folded…. “

People - she looked at me like I had three heads. She said, “I can’t do that!” I said, “Why not?” She said, “Nooooo. No. NO.”

Trust me when I tell you I am relaying this story without judgment because I was the chick who once lost sleep over my own missing toddler socks. But here was my friend who is literally drowning in laundry and can’t get the clean stuff out of the basket and into the drawer because her brain is telling her it has to be perfectly folded or not done at all.

This is why my underwear are unfolded in a drawer. They’ve been that way for years now. Guess what —- the world is still turning.

Sometimes the key to unlocking some peace in your life is JUST LEARNING TO DO IT CRAPPY and LET IT GO.

NOT EVERYTHING HAS TO BE PERFECT and a medicated Virgo perfectionist is typing this so I am sure you can get there, too.

Where are some areas good enough could be enough in your day?

What if slightly damp dishes got put away in the cabinet? GASP!

What if you just throw all your mismatched socks from the basket into your drawer and figure it out when you need a pair? OMG!

Wash a whole mixed-up load of laundry on cold without sorting and see how it comes out? THE NERVE.

Now - I do realize and accept that sometimes perfect or close-to-perfect is important. Measuring ingredients in a baked goods recipe? Yes. That needs accuracy. Surgeons? Pilots? Of course I’m not thinking they are in the business of GOOD ENOUGH.

But most of us are out here putting all this effort into a bunch stuff that doesn’t really matter. Because when you are drowning in your home, getting the stuff closer to where it needs to be is better than not at all. Unfolded underwear in the drawer where they belong are better than underwear in a laundry basket and that is a hill I’m willing to die on.