Image by RODNAE Productions
Part of being a minimalist is not only having only what you need, but keeping what you have in order and clean, but also creating good habits that help us to be consistent in this while considering our own needs and limitations. Maintaining these habits on your own is sometimes difficult, but it can be done. But when we have young children, maintaining our own habits and theirs can be hard work.
At home, after my two older children grew up and made their own lives, there were only my 3 young children, my husband and I. My husband came from the city and I had always lived in small towns and although we were born in the same country, we had very different customs, cultures and habits. He, for example, came from a place where the pace of life is quite fast, he always did things very fast and sometimes I got a little angry with him, because when we had some activity he was always rushing me.
Image by cottonbro studio
For my part, I was used to do things more calmly and I took my time to do things well done, this at first was the cause of some arguments, until we got used to each other, but as for the children, although it was difficult to take care of the 3 together we could create routines that somehow made life easier for us, for example we had the habit of getting up to make the bed and put in place the clothes and shoes when we arrived.
But when they stopped being children and reached the difficult stage of adolescence, things were not so easy for my husband and me, those routines were forgotten by them and to make them do certain tasks was something difficult to achieve, in these circumstances to create my own habits and also to teach them to my children, was something that seemed impossible. I have always liked order and I despaired that they did not like it as much as I did, but I had to learn that this should not be so.
Image by Ron Lach
Living at home with several people does not make it easy to maintain our habits, but I want to tell you how I was able to overcome this situation and make sure that we could all enjoy our home and our family. With patience little by little we assigned tasks to each one of us, my son was in charge of mowing the garden every week and keeping his room tidy, my two daughters took turns to wash the dishes and my husband and I did our part, but also as a family, we cleaned the house thoroughly every week.
This was not always easy, sometimes someone didn't want to do their share but we were not inflexible, so we exchanged our responsibilities so that the person who didn't feel like it or was tired would do it later or do someone else's share. It took time, but then it was no longer necessary to remind them what it was their turn to do, everyone knew it and did their own thing and this helped them, but also me.
Image by Monstera
I learned that no one has to be the same as me, so I could not expect them to want to have everything as tidy as I do, but even if not, you can learn to be disciplined, keep order at home and that this becomes a good habit without the need to exhaust us in excess or not considering our own limitations, today two of my children have their own family and I can see that those good habits we learned together, are still marked in their memory and my husband, my youngest daughter and I, we keep calm distributing the responsibilities of the home.
Even if we are not minimalists, having good habits benefits us all, we need order in our busy lives and when we manage to do it, then we are clearer to also take care of what we have to do at work, so having good habits from childhood, can also help us as adults to fulfill our responsibilities and maintain a peaceful life.