Not lazy, just needing "proper motivation"...

The last 6 months or so living in the shop have been tough. Since Joshua hit 18 months I have had two little kiddos getting into, getting things out, spilling, crushing (as in goldfish/crackers, Josh's favorite thing), essentially wreaking havoc, on my house. Our current living situation severely lacks any place to "put things away" and as a result nothing is safe, or ever really totally cleaned up. I am a SAHM, so my two major "jobs" are to keep my kids happy/healthy and to keep my house (and all that implies; laundry, dishes, dinner, etc..). Lately the second half of that equation has been lacking, to be honest I have just gotten tired of the never ending list of things that could be done. Some of you may say this is the life of a SAHM (or any mom) but I have lived in "regular" houses (with a kid) and it was never like this. At the very least things would stay clean (mostly anyway) for more than one hour, here, not so much. This struggle has led me to believe that perhaps I am lazy, that I am just not good at what I do. It has been hard on my self esteem in a lot of ways, maybe that sounds silly but if I am no good at 1/2 of my "job" it's easy to deceive yourself into thinking you aren't good at any of your "jobs".

The house nearing completion has opened my eyes to the lie I have been telling myself. I have worked day in and day out preparing for this move. I have done laundry, packed boxes, cleaned, cleaned, cleaned. Today, aside from an hour of down time while Josh naps, I have been moving since waking up. In the last two days I have filled my truck full of construction debris & been to the dump twice. The outside of my house is now nearly free of the junk that had been thrown out over the winter and then buried by snow. Somehow I have even managed to take a few minutes for myself, plenty of time for my kids & made dinner! Turns out I am not lazy, I've just been lacking proper motivation when it comes to house work. I know that laundry, dishes, mopping, vacuuming, etc... will never go away. I am sure I will have times in the future when I wane in my cleaning/upkeep but I have a feeling most of those times will be because there were better things for me to do (you know, like playing with my kids, snuggling with my husband, laughing with friends & family), rather than because I simply exhausted of the crazy pattern.

I guess I share this to say that sometimes it is easy to deceive ourselves into believing we are less then what we truly are. Sometimes we get frustrated and down, forgetting that it's just a passing phase of life, not a definition of who we are. Everyone has moments, everyone slacks from time to time. Learn to recognize these moments, take them for what they are and move past them. Don't beat yourself up over it all, housework certainly will not go anywhere. The harder I was on myself, the less motivated I became. The truth is I do a pretty good job, maybe my house will never be on the cover of Good Housekeeping heading an article about spotless living, but that's ok. There are many more important things in life anyway...