No matter who you are, when it comes to improving your skills as a homemaker there are two important things to keep in mind:
- Put on a professional mindset.
- Understand that what we usually consider to be homemaking is actually two different roles.
At the age of 20, when I first started my more than two decades’ worth of being a full-time homemaker, I quickly realized that if I didn’t somehow learn how to own that difficult role, then the role was going to own me. Like many of you, I also experienced feelings of being overwhelmed with the day-to-day tasks of managing a home because 1) I didn’t know what I was doing, and 2) I lacked a way to measure success. In work roles outside the home, we usually experience some form of “kudos” or praise for a job well done (pats on the back or a raise in pay) that help us see our skills are improving and our efforts are appreciated. The full-time homemaker usually does not have access to any of this. So what do you do?
USE A PROFESSIONAL MINDSET
For me, the solution was to put on a professional mindset. One day the thought popped into my head: “Wait a minute. If I was working outside the home, how would I be thinking about my job? Would I be feeling like a victim or would I be putting on a professional mindset and taking charge?” I decided then and there that if this was the job that I had to do, then I was going to be the best homemaker I could be. That was the day I started using a planner and began doing professional development by acquiring every bit of knowledge I could that would help me do my job with excellence. This is a much better mindset than going along, not knowing what to do, feeling like a victim, and sinking into despair.
“HOMEMAKER” IS NOT THE SAME AS “MOMMY”
Along with putting on a professional mindset, the other idea that can help you be successful is to understand that when we usually talk about homemaking, what we’re actually talking about are two different roles. There are many wonderful, delightful mommy blogs out there that share extremely helpful insights into the world of trying to run a home, but the mistake they make is to smash two roles together into one. This makes it very difficult to know what task is best to do and when. It may be nice to say it’s better to rock your baby than to do the dusting because “babies don’t keep,” but in practical reality, that idea just doesn’t work. It’s much easier to serenely rock a baby to sleep in a beautiful, orderly, and clean home…without any giant dust bunnies under the beds.
TWO DIFFERENT ROLES
The role of the Homemaker is to manage the physical, social, and financial environments and resources of a home. The role of the Parent is to teach and train children to help them grow up into being capable, responsible adults. If the Homemaker does her or his job well, then this can help the Parent be more successful. And if the Parent does her or his job well, then that can help the Homemaker be more successful. For example, by keeping the home in order, the Homemaker makes it much easier for the Parent to get the children out the door and to school on time. Shoes can be easily found, and lunches are always ready. And by teaching and training children to do chores and straighten up their own rooms, the Parent makes life much easier for the Homemaker, because now there is more than one person in the home helping to turn chaos into order.
OWN YOUR LIFE
Homemaking can be done and it can be done well. If you will think of it as a profession, just like any other, with tasks and skills that can be learned, and if you will (if you are in this situation) recognize which tasks belong to the Homemaker role and which tasks belong to the Parenting role, then homemaking can actually be a source of confidence and pride. The more you learn how to do it well, the more you can own your own life. Putting on the right mindset and understanding which role you are doing (and when) can make all the difference.
