Today, I would want us to talk about TIME and how as homemakers, we think we have so much of it, without realizing how little is available to us. If our goal is to save time and strength, then we have to be fully aware of how much time we truly have at our disposal and how we can maximize that time to manage our homes.
As you know we have 24 hours in a day. But out of those 24 hours, you also have sleeping time, school prep time, spousal time, work time, relaxation time, cooking time, worship time and so on. If you are a full time SaHM, you probably have 10-12 hours to do home making. If you run a business from home or have a 9 to 5 without a domestic staff, it get trickier, you have just about 2-5 hours left.
What this breakdown tells me is that except the time that you have is managed wisely, you will lose control of things around the house. This also means when a schedule is being created for house chores, it is to be created not with 24 hours in mind, but with the available time for house chores.
Another thing is also apportioning the chores so that you are not overwhelmed from it and unable to meet up with other demands of the day. For example, you decide to go to the market before school pick up time. You may be too time conscious to negotiate well for goods or look around for variety, you cannot predict the traffic and may be late for pick-up or you will show up for pick up super exhausted.
So let me tie this up. If you understand yourself, your home and your already non-negotiable routines like I discussed last week, it will help you understand the exact amount of time you really have to do chores and help you create a more reasonable and workable routine.
Now you see why for you, creating a routine is more complex and you cannot work with the same routine/schedule as a domestic staff.
I know of a work from home mum, who apportions core household chores to two time frames in a day. First at late afternoon, and the next time frame at night after she put the kids to bed. She gets things done faster and is more efficient with this arrangement. I will explain the details in another email.
In conclusion, I leave you with this activity: After taking out time for all your core non-negotiable activities in the day minus chores, how many hours do you really have as FREE time, left for home-making. Do it for each day of the week, because each day differs. E.g Sunday mornings may be for worship which is non negotiable, but the time spent in your place of worship may not be as long as the time spent working.
If you managed to read to this point, then you’re the real MVP. Cheers.
Wishing you a very productive week.