Clutter, Family Tension, and the Dream of Life with Less Stuff

Something stinks in this house, but I promise the diaper pail has been emptied, the cat box cleaned, and the garbage cans brought to the curb. You know when you open a new shower curtain there’s that chemical reek that makes you wonder whether humanity has signed a collective suicide pact with a poison pen? I’m overcome by that stench right now and it’s wafting from the homes of every family engaged in "typical" 21st century family life.

That smell isn't just coming from the shower curtains… it’s in everything from the Tupperwares that hold leftovers we’ll never eat to the cheap imported toys our kids will never play with.

The biggest fights my husband and I have are over clutter and house cleaning. Sure, we’re really arguing about something immaterial and much more important, but it's the crap we keep tripping over that makes us fall into arguments and lose ourselves through fits of martyred isolation. ("I'm the only one who does everything around here!" "You don't see me, you only see what I failed to do!")

Anyway, we find ourselves without plans on the Saturday before Christmas, which already has me feeling uneasy (shouldn't we be out doing something festive to show our kids we care, never mind that we have two or three things planned for tomorrow?). I feel the anxiety wash over us and threaten to drown the day as I push an island of construction paper and markers to the center of the dining table so we can all sit down to eat together.

Cue the Mommy Rage

I want to escape this wretched, cluttered hell hole, but then I remember that this house (this vast, beautiful, underwater-mortgage house) is meant to be our center of peace and renewal where love and memories roost and thrive.

I'm angry that this sanctuary has been taken from us. I'm angry at us for being such slobs.

I'm at once the victim and the avenging angel. We're persecuted at our own hands and the hands of those who allegedly love us. We're being brought down by our STUFF. We will vanquish greed and we will see the floor again, dammit!

And so, we embark on a journey to the center of the stink - the nightmare that is "the toy area." Once upon a time, this spot behind the couch that used to hold bookshelves. That was before the Barbies and the Jedis arrived and all my author friends were exiled to lopsided stacks in the basement.

As a family, we plough through endless little pieces of plastic and synthetic fur covered animals. I swear the whole place reeks with the poisonous gas of petroleum byproducts. And then I watch my pure little baby gnawing on everything from fancy European teething toys to that glitzy, feathered Dollar Store tiara.

Now, Now. Be Nice.

Santa's watching and none of this is very nice.

Nice… that’s what we were trying to be as new parents who bought the alphabet blocks and accepted countless Fisher Price castaways. That’s what grandparents and aunties and friends visiting from out of town are trying to be when they give the girls another teddy bear.

And we’re being nice when we tramp down our anger and our desire to nail this proclamation to the front door and the top of the Facebook profiles: “Give thee not plastic crap and other ridiculous toys. Our children need not your charity nor your hand me downs. They need your attention and your love!”

(I have no idea why this proclamation must be worded in an awkward approximation of fairy tale English other than I’m hiding behind humor to make the message seem, well, nicer.)

But there’s another nasty, naughty shadow looming over our best tidying efforts… Because I need to prove to my daughters - and to the world - that we are very nice people, there’s actually more, brand new plastic crap hidden in the closet. On Christmas morning, for at least 15 minutes that stuff will seem like loved tied up with red and green bows. By New Year's Eve, favorites will emerge and the stuff that didn’t make the cut will be lost under the couch or covered in indiscriminate baby drool.

“Santa made me do it!” is starting to sound like a really lame excuse.

And so, still fueled by my anger and despair, I’m thinking way beyond the bag of matchbox cars in front of me.

Becoming an Activist in the Anti-Stuff Revolution

I know we’re not the only ones who feel this way. I’ve been spending time with home designers lately - one a dear friend and one a dear client. Their work isn’t about picking the right drapes. It’s about helping people create livable spaces that reflect the way they really want to live. We need professional help to feel at home in our houses because we’re so alienated by all this random detritus that seems an inevitable part of life.

And I’m looking deeper to the origins of this shadow - the designers can help me organize all this junk, but it’s up to me to control what actually makes it through the door.

I’m dreaming of a movement where we all have the courage to say “thanks, but no thanks.” No more party favors, no more souvenirs from the airport, no more collectible sets of your favorite Disney friends. No more stuff.

If someone want’s a gift, give a ballet class or pay for a day of summer camp. It was painful to realize we boxed worthless stuff that originally cost hundreds of dollars but that we’ll struggle to pay for July’s Wild Earth camp when registration opens in a few months.

I can’t imagine I need a new project in 2015, but I would love to put Kim John Payne’s Simplicity Parenting into action in this way by convincing other families that we can stop wrapping gifts and instead offer support - and experiences - that count.

Ideas, inspiration, and commiseration welcome!

Note: This post was inspired by a prompt offered as part of  Jeffrey Davis's December, 2014 project called #Quest2015  in which twelve visionaries offered twelve questions to inspire you to live your best twelve months. I was responding to Eric Klein of WisdomHeart.com who asked:  "How will you face your shadow bag and stop the stink, so you can bring forth what is best within you in 2015? What can you claim right now?"

"It's Different for Moms" Is a Cop Out

“Pursue knowledge, daily gain. Pursue Tao (wisdom), daily loss.” – Tao Te Ching We often think too much about adding new things, when the source of a lot of our growth is eliminating old things. What do you need to STOP doing in 2015? And what do you need to do to make that STOPPING more than an intention?

So asks Charlie Gilkey of Productive Flourishing. offers this prompt as part of Jeffrey Davis’s #Quest2015 – “12 days with 12 visionaries to imagine your 12 best months.” (I’m collecting some of my responses on this blog. Read others here and here.)

When I first read this prompt, I had an immediate reaction, and it wasn’t that pleasant. I don’t know Charlie at all. I’ve landed on his website a couple times and I’ve listened to a couple of podcasts. But truthfully, My lack of knowledge about Charlie and his story didn’t give me any pause as the internal chatter began.

Hush now. It's Different for Moms.

“Typical guy perspective, assuming that STOPPING is some sort of innovative, foreign concept! I can think of half a dozen things I should stop doing right now: stop snapping at my daughters when I’m actually angry with myself; stop eating this and drinking that; stop checking my phone first thing in the morning; stop leaving the garage door open; stop subscribing to services I don’t have time to use; stop putting ‘couch downtime’ over intimacy.”

“See, Charlie!” I exclaimed inside my head. (Charlie had ceased to be an actual person and just became The Man Named Charlie). “I’m steeped in the wisdom of elimination! And not just because I track a baby’s bowel movements each day. I so get that the key to happiness isn’t to do more and have more. As a mother I understand that simplicity is fundamental. And let me tell you, I know I don't need to add one more thing to my list. Yeah, thanks Charlie - I totally got this. But there are about a million ways the world would fall apart if I STOPPED, so I’ll fulfill my duty to this this prompt later."

My final thought, “This guy seems really accomplished. But he’s not really speaking to me. After all, it’s different for moms.”

Revisiting and Reevaluating Judgment

And then I launched into my wild thicket of a day in which I hoped to get some writing done on my book, plan the menu for the week and grocery shop with a real strategy (for once), work on my website copy, and clean the house a little. Oh, and mother that teething baby who was going to be with me all day long.

Halfway through athe morning that had nothing to show for it but a new pile of dirty dishes and dirty diapers and a failed nap attempt, I heard a new voice trying to interrupt my self righteous little interior monologue. My electrical engineer husband, who generally leaves the conversation and the analysis to me, had remarked a few weeks ago, "for someone who is supposed to be so open minded, you're really judgmental sometimes."

Oh, dammit. Um, sorry Charlie.

Moving Beyond Sexism, Ideology, and those Judgtastic Tendencies

Back when husband made that observation about my judgtastic tendencies I'd scribbled a journal entry that never made it to the screen. In a nutshell… Happen to remember the #shirtstorm? The lead scientist who landed something or other on a comet made a very poor wardrobe choice during his moment in the limelight. The polo shirt, covered in scantily clad female video game characters was seen as an outrageous slight to women in STEM. Others were outraged that all bloggers people could talk about was an ugly shirt when real scientific history was being made.

All worked up, I took my side with the earthlings who deserved to be affronted by yet another blatant example of women’s objectification. After all, I’m a feminist - it’s my job to speak against chauvinism and to enlighten the masses who still don’t get that sexism is a problem. Screw the bigger picture and the Star Trek fantasies - that shirt was a trigger and I was so happy go off like a gender equality seeking missile according to the script.

Then there was this series of intriguing, important conversations on Google+ about this whole issue (where I’d first heard about the whole flap). These social media exchanges and thatan eye opening chat with husband made me realize I was giving away a whole lot of personal agency whenif I leptwas going to leap at every bit of antifeminist link bait and ignored the bigger picture. (Comet landings may actually be more important than one deeply foolish individual after all.)

In 2015, Let's Quit...

So, this was weeks ago and I was meant to have learned my lesson about making snap judgments and choosing ideology over critical thinking. But it seems that it takes more than a few Google+ posts to change what is likely a lifelong habit. It also takes a quest!

So, here’s what I am stopping in 2015:

• Making snap judgements in order to protect myself, speed tasks that seem too tricky, and save me from rigorous self-inquiry
• Hiding behind ideologies that give me the stock answers to questions both simple and complex and help me hide behind tribe-think

And here’s one more that’s even more personal…

• I’m going to stop using my children as an excuse to play it small, ignore counsel that could help me grow, and to avoid taking personal risks.

Again, sorry Charlie. My judgmental little heart is full of gratitude.

When a Disappointing Start is Exactly What You Need

Who are you willing to disappoint or offend or upset or abandon… for the sake of the Great Work that’s calling you for your best 2015?

Michael Bungay-Stanier offers this prompt as part of Jeffrey Davis's #Quest2015 - "12 days with 12 visionaries to imagine your 12 best months." (I'm collecting some of my responses on this blog. Read others here and here.)

I'm ready to disappoint anyone who wants to be disappointed in me. Anyone who feels that what I have to offer - anything from my time to my words to my love - is so expendable that it could "disappoint" is off my perpetual Christmas card list.

Playing with a working definition here: To be disappointed in someone is to impose your own needs and expectations upon another. It is to assume that your own journey takes precedence and lose track of the relationship and the Bigger Story.

The Theory of a New Year

In 2015, I don't have time for such one-sided, calculating arrangements disguised as friendships or business relationships.

But even as I share such sweeping statements, I cringe. There are some people I'm disappointed in right now. There are people whose journeys I don't have the bandwidth to value and so I see their needs as less relevant than mine. I want something from them, but I don't want their drama or their excuses.

That means I need to hold court with abandonment, as mentioned in the prompt above. I'm going to have to sit alone in an icy chamber after all is said about not enough being done to sustain the relationship. If disappointment can fester in my chest, there’s something deeply out of alignment. Something in me. I need to let someone go or I need to at least reset the relationship.

The Reality of a New Year - Midnight Parenting Edition

I have to take this out of theory. There's no place less theoretical than a five year old's bed at 11 pm on a Sunday night.

Husband and I were "relaxing" with a show about murder and mayhem (hmm... Is such "entertainment" something to consider abandoning?) and our daughter appeared at the bottom of the stairs. Wordless, frowning, wanting to be held, but not touched all at once. Depending on your perspective, she was either surly or scared, sweaty or sweetly flushed with sleep.

Because I'm up too late, disappointed in myself for accomplishing too little in a day and upset that I don't have the strength to avoid the gravitational pull of my husband's arms and an episode of The Blacklist, I saw all of these things in our girl. And I saw my own irritation and compassion too.

I took her upstairs and I wrestled my personal “shouldas” until they fell off my back and promised to wait for me outside the bedroom door. We'd reconvene when this unexpected bout of mothering was done. For now, climbed in beside my first born, my "intense" child. She told me she'd had a bad dream - somehow being given too many snowmen she couldn't return was terrifying (retail trauma starts early, it seems). And then she mumbled something about "I'll be good for Christmas."

That's when the snowball packed with a cruel handful of gravel hit my cheek. That's when I held her tighter and truly - finally - let go of every shred of my agenda. For real this time. I remembered all I'm supposed to know as a healer, a creature who bandies about the word consciousness several times a day. I wasn't thinking of it at the time, I swear, but in that moment I decided I was going to be the mom that the people who like my daily #365feministselfie think I am.

Now, parenting a kid is first about parenting yourself.

I have carried disappointment in myself the way heroes carry a vial that contains the antidote to a deadly disease. My internal disappointment has served a precious talisman against hurt. “Ha ha! You can't tear me down if I already did it more beautifully and terribly!”

Here’s the truth: when mama’s not feeling good about herself, there ain’t nobody in this house permitted to feel particularly good about herself. I don’t mean to be so impatient, to explode in moments of irrational seeming frustration. I certainly don’t mean to hold you to the impossible standards I hold myself. But I do.

You, my Moira, are my mirror. When I feel strong, I revel in your strength. I give you permission to be as strong as you are. And when I feel disappointed in myself, I see all the ways you don’t measure up. I get upset about my parenting skills and, sometimes, your very way of being in the world.

Because I see this happening, I know I’m a good deal better off than I used to. There’s hope for us, kiddo. There’s hope for all of us when we can be aware of what’s hard and what’s broken and what’s vulnerable.

Now, that I’ve plumbed my disappointed depths, back to the question.

To Enjoy a Disappointment-Free Year, I Must First Disappoint

Who can I bear to disappoint or abandon, upset or offend?  Not my kids, not my husband, not my closest family and friends. They’re the ones who love me anyway, so they’re not looking to be disappointed in the first place.

I am willing to disappoint MYSELF.

I am willing to seriously piss off the part of me that equates worth with work. I am will to abandon the part of me that says getting it done is worth saying “Give mummy a few more minutes. She has to work” almost every time my girls asks me to play with her or “watch this!”

I am willing to disappoint the aspects of myself that don’t have compassion or love for ME.

I’m willing to let anyone down - myself included -  who believes my real work is the business or the book or the online presence.

My real work is done at 11 PM on a Sunday night. And it may leave me wrecked in the morning. And it may mean I miss a deadline. But if you think I’m worth it anyway, then I think you’re worth it too.