But even with all of my progress, I still found myself saying over and over 'Cheryl - get your life together!' Something just wasn't jiving in my life. I'm making a lot of progress on my goals - what else was I missing? Where was this discontent coming from? With tax season and long hours of work looming in the not-so-distant future, I was really digging deep to figure it out.
Then my brother David came home last weekend. This is where the story begins... I washed the bedding in the spare room and swept up a little, but nothing major. I mean, he's my brother - do I really need to make it shine like the top of the Chrysler building for him? Then again, I am that girl that needs about three days notice before company arrives became my house is disaster zone. As I mentioned in my last post, I'm a habitual project beginner, but not a project finisher. Projects like painting furniture, painting walls or even cleaning just never found their way to completion. I find myself often explaining away and excusing the mess to the brave few that happen to stop by unannounced... but at what point do I just flat out admit that I'm slovenly borderline hoarder? And at what point do I admit just how much my messy house was holding me back in other parts of my life?
The answer to my Chrysler building question is a definite no. However, during his short visit in my home, David cleaned, helped me take a sad little Christmas tree down and put it away, did my dishes (with Mr. Clean all-purpose cleaner, but this beggar will not be caught choosing!) and helped me sweep mounds of cat litter and other disgusting-ness. It meant so much to have some help for a few days after years of maintaining a home by myself! But then he left and I just knew my house would just go back to the gross state it had been. That is, until I posted a funny (yet un-related) picture on Facebook of a tshirt that said 'I'm not single. I have a cat.' HI-larious, right?! And so fitting! Before long, my phone dinged with a notification - a comment from David, which is nothing new, but it said (and I quote) "...and a couple of things in the corner that could be either more cats of just giant balls of cat hair." And immediately, I felt embarrassed. HOW could he say that out loud...on Facebook? Didn't he know how many people would read that?! I hovered over the delete button - I couldn't just leave that comment there for the world to see! But then it hit me. Like a ton of bricks inside a Mack truck. I was so sensitive about this comment because it was so true. My life was not together because my house was not together. How simple, but yet, so profound. To me, at least.
I went to bed that Friday night with more determination than I'd felt in a long time. I was going to get some rest...I was going to sleep in... I was going to get up in the morning and enjoy a cup or two of coffee... and then I was going to put on my working clothes and GET MY LIFE TOGETHER. And that, I did. Or at least I started to.
Saturday morning, I somehow persuaded a 12 year old to help me clean - with only the promise of a ten dolla bill and a Starbucks gift card as incentive. She was all too happy to join me and was more help than I probably deserved. I still have a little ways to go before I can accept uninvited guests, but in one short day the two of us got enough done to pick up momentum. And sometimes a little momentum is all you need.
So, to make a short story long, the next time you find yourself offended by someone or something, really dig deep to figure out why you're even offended in the first place. It's possible that it's something inside of you that you're avoiding. And if you address it and get real with yourself (or have a brother to punch you in the gut with your truth), you may find out that it's that very thing that offends you that's holding you back from getting YO life together.
