I am sharing excerpts from my e-workbook, Spring Cleaning for the Heart and Home available in the P31 Bookstore.

A Desire to Change

     Change is hard. Sometimes we like change. But most of the time, change makes us stress out. Sometimes we just don’t want to change. In order to change a bad habit, we must really change the way we think.

    I mentioned earlier that I used to be a really bad housekeeper. Okay, so some of that had to do with age and immaturity. (I was a teenage mother very young.) But mostly it just had to do with my own selfish attitude. I resented having to clean the house. Why? I don’t really know now, but I hated it. Laziness, I suppose. I created a set of bad habits for myself. I didn’t really even know how to clean a house. But I was mostly just lazy about it.

“Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands.” Proverbs 14:1

  It is hard to be a good house keeper when you hate being a house keeper. Well, let me put it this way. It is hard to be motivated to clean the house when you hate cleaning the house. Where do we get our motivation from?

[Tweet “It’s hard to be a good house keeper when you hate being a house keeper.”]

   Some people are just naturally born with a clean gene. You will find them scrubbing the floors when they are happy or upset or just bored. I’m not really talking to you people.

This is for those of us who were born with a natural inclination to be messy and disorganized. I used to be messy and disorganized. I was a closet slob. However, I changed. I really like cleaning the house. I like having a tidy home. I enjoy puttering around the house. I want my home to be company ready – but not for company! I want my house to look nice for my family every day!

  As my heart began to change, I found out that deep down inside, I wasn’t a slob – I was a homemaker. But I needed self-discipline. Self-discipline is doing what you don’t really want to do, just because you need to.

[Tweet “Are you like the wise woman who builds her house up?”]

Are you like the wise woman who builds her house up? Or do you find yourself acting like the foolish woman tearing down your house with your words and actions?

Today’s Goal: Print out this handy chart to help you discover the problem areas in your home that need the most work.

Today’s Spring Clean Challenge:

• Deep clean the bathroom(s).

Instagram Photo Challenge:  Take a picture of your favorite household cleaner. Use hashtag #p31springclean.

I’ll be focusing on one area – however seemingly small – in my home each day for the next two weeks. With the rotating weekly chore list in my This is My Life Planner, I’m easily able to remember to maintain chores – which keeps my house neater and cleaner on a daily basis.