Your Questions Answered, Part 2

Kristin asked specifically about FlyLady and the rosary, both of which are fertile ground for breeding that alarming monster, the Perfectionist-Slacker hybrid. You can recognize it by its giant trailing flagellum (the better to beat you with, my dear) and its nauseous miasma of self-loathing.

I first subscribed to FlyLady's emails not long after she started sending them, eleven years ago, and I have been an off-and-on subscriber ever since. There are three things I have learned in those eleven years that may be useful (but may also be obvious). First, I have finally figured out that nobody else's program is going to work for me exactly as written. FlyLady and I part company early on, because I don't wear shoes in the house and I have no intention of doing so. (That was the big asterisk in my 2010 FlyLady resolution: "...everything* FlyLady tells me *except about wearing shoes because why would I want lead-contaminated soil and stray bits of dog poop tracked all over my carpet?") My house, my kids, my priorities -- why would she be able to predict exactly how I should keep my life in order?

Second, there are two truths in tension when it comes to FlyLady. I'm almost always glad when I do something she tells me to do. At the same time, I can only do everything she tells me if that's my primary focus. Outings with my kids seem to get pushed aside because I have one more FlyLady task to accomplish and suddenly it's naptime so we can't go out. It's better for me to plan on doing part of the package, perhaps choosing a particular habit to work on, and give myself upfront permission to delete freely.

This leads into #3, which is a hard one for me: running a household with small children is just not easy. There's this misperception that it's only housework, only childcare, and if you weren't a lazy slob you would just get it done. I disagree. Even in a small house there are a zillion things that need doing and entropy is an implacable force. It took me years to admit something that you may find self-evident (or whiny, depending on your POV), but I suspect I am not the only one out there laboring under the weight of a false idea. It's not an easy gig. Don't beat yourself up if you struggle: it's not you, it's the job.

Next up, the rosary. For those of you who aren't Catholic, the rosary is a structured meditation in which a person reflects on events in the lives of Jesus and Mary. A person could sit down for 20 minutes and pray the rosary contemplatively, pondering in turn the mysteries and the related scripture and her intentions and the words of the prayers. A person could also pray the rosary on the run, counting Hail Marys on her fingers while folding laundry and stopping in the middle of a sentence to redirect a contumacious child. Such a person might get to the eighth Hail Mary and say, "Wait, what decade is this supposed to be?"

Honestly, the rosary at my house looks like option B more often than option A. My strength is not contemplation. My strength is showing up. I cannot pretend to offer guidance on how to pray like St. Teresa, but I can tell you that you won't get to ecstatic union if you don't keep showing up. (Let me throw in here that I love Peter Kreeft's little book Prayer for Beginners -- it's just full of good stuff.) If you are trying to get started with the rosary, think of option A as a destination, not a starting point. Contemplation, kind of like keeping house, is harder than I expected it to be. It's reasonable to start small.

If you are trying to fit the rosary in, it may be useful to know that it takes less than three minutes to pray a decade. It may be useful to pray along with a recording so that you are not derailed by a moment of distraction, or so that you can do something mindless with your hands. I often pray the rosary while washing dishes or folding laundry. A person could complain that this diminished attention debases the rosary, though I hope only a really crabby person would think that. I prefer to think that I am sanctifying the housework.

Because a decade of the rosary is quick and composed of familiar prayers, it's fairly easy to do with kids. We almost never sit down to pray five decades, the way a Good Catholic Family^TM might, but one decade I can manage. Instead of launching into an unbroken string of Hail Marys, I usually give them a brief thought to reflect on at the beginning, after the third Hail Mary, and after the seventh Hail Mary. The goal is to combine facts and food for thought, so I might say, "Forty days after his Resurrection Jesus rose up into heaven as his apostles watched," and then, "We honor your authority over heaven and earth," and finally, "We ask for the grace to carry your holy truth into the world" -- just something quick and off the cuff that I hope will help those words from Acts 1 sink into their heads. The kids can all tell you that it takes less than three minutes but it's longer if you interrupt. And you know, maybe if I were a better mother I wouldn't emphasize how fast it's over, but I have to tell you they're almost always willing to cooperate -- in part because it's short.

One last idea, because my word count is creeping up and up, is to pray the rosary with a child who is going to sleep. To teach my children how to go to sleep without nursing, I would rub their backs and pray the rosary quietly. I think it is a lovely peaceful association for them -- my 8yo (who has been weaned for a long time!) still asks me to tuck him in that way.

So-- I am a half-hearted FlyLady follower, but my house is cleaner than it used to be. And I am hardly a rosary role model, but I can tell you that good things will follow if you just show up.

Comments

[Celeste]

The only things I got out of FlyLady is the idea of giving a room a blessing by cleaning it...think about how you want it to be a better space to make a meal for your family, a more comfortable area for time together, a more restful place to sleep, etc.

I think she put in the part about wearing shoes because many women use their barefootedness as a reason not to take the trash out, put something in the car to be donated on the next trip, go downstairs to clean or declutter, and so on. I do find that wearing shoes focuses me, but I also have your concerns about dirty shoes. My way of dealing is to have a pair that I just wear in the house on days when I'm not going out. Works for me, since my seriously fallen arches just do better in shoes than barefoot.

Deep down I think that whatever works to keep the home someplace that people would like to be, is good.

[Ruth]

I've so enjoyed these posts about perfectionism, cleaning and the rosary! As a fellow Catholic, reforming perfectionist and former messie, (and also SLP), I relate. I'm wondering if you have read Sandra Felton's "Messie no More" series? I've read her work and FlyLady's and I prefer Sandra's. More humor, more realism, and it's fun to read what it's like for her to be a former messie and pastor's wife. Her work has transformed me from a real messie to a mostly reformed messie and I'll stay happy in that category as I'm no longer a perfectionist (mostly!). As for the rosary, I'm a failure there! However, last night I couldn't sleep and my non-rosary praying Catholic husband said, 'try praying the rosary--quietly!). I have to say, it was wonderful.

[Kristin]

Thank you!

I think the tide started turning for me when I read about Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J., waking up in the morning to find his rosary beads in his hand...because he had fallen asleep somewhere in the middle. Well, says I, if he can do it....and that's when I started doing some more reading and thinking, and dug my beads out of my jewelry box...and got intimidated, and then read about a mom who does a decade in the car with her kids, and another decade later, etc.

In one of the books I read, another mom talked about arranging her decades around 5 "Ps" -- partner, parent, etc. -- and directing her prayer in those areas. Intriguing. The flexibility of this is really inspiring...and also daunting: these people have found ways to really incorporate the rosary into their lives, while I hesitate to dive in.

Maybe it's time to leap. =)

Thanks again --

[Tracy]

I've done flylady in various forms for the past several years, and it always helps, but then my e-mail inbox overwhelms me. Since I use gmail, I set up a filter to have all her e-mails go into - and all of a sudden I had a million unread messages - I'd delete. After all, my inbox is one of my hot spots ;-D.

But every time I remember to do certain things, the rest always seems to follow. A clean empty sink somehow always leads to a clean kitchen. And yesterday I set a timer for 15 minutes and dove into the hall closet that is desperate for a declutter/reorganization. Only 15 minutes and I can see the progress (okay it was more like 23 minutes, because I had to clean up/put away/throw away the things I'd pulled out). But it was doable. (thanks again for the reminder about the timer!)

And I think I may meet my monthly goal - a clean organized hall closet. What a joy that will be for me to be able to open that door and not feel upset that it's a mess!

I am not Catholic, as you know! but my resolution this year is to PRAY. I'm finding that I need to have some set times to set the stage - and if I pray just 3-5 minutes... then more follows. And more.

Love your answers, btw - glad to know it wasn't just me who has to remember that my kids/family are important too!

[Sarah in Ottawa]

THANK YOU for this post, Jamie. My seeming inability to get stuff done around the house with two littles (one a month younger than Stella, one 4 months old) and my inability to get my prayer life in gear has been my preoccupation today. Mighty Maggie and I were having a side conversation on it, in fact. Your words have come at just the right time; they are balm to the soul!

I've let my daily rosary slide since I was on modified bed rest at the end of my most recent pregnancy. I've got to get back on the proverbial horse.

But shoes in the house? I'm Canadian; I know no one who does this since it's wet and yucky for half the year. It just seems like it'd lead to WAAAY more work!

[el-e-e]

I love this. I think "Just Show Up" is a good goal for a lot of things, and most especially for prayer. Thank you.

[JaneC]

I know what Celeste means about wearing shoes leading to not taking the trash out, etc. I tend to go barefoot in the house, and this has been a problem for me. I have found it a good compromise, though, to wear rubber-bottomed slippers in the house. I don't feel bad about wearing them outside for short trips to fetch the mail or take out the garbage, but they stay pretty clean and are easier to wash than real shoes. In summer, of course, I just leave a pair of flip-flops by the door.

[The Sojourner]

I haven't ever tried FlyLady, but I've heard of her she loses me on the shoe thing too. About 8 months out of the year I'll happily go outside barefoot (in Ohio), and now I have this nice pair of slip-on shoes that I've been keeping by the garage door and using when I need to go into the garage/outside. What do you mean I should wear socks when it's 20 degrees outside?

I have a pretty good routine at school of praying the rosary during the day--those 5 minutes while I'm sitting at my desk waiting for class to start are perfect for rattling off a decade. At the beginning of the semester I was also doing (most of) a second rosary lying in bed because my good friend Major Depressive Episode wouldn't let me sleep until I'd gone through at least 3 or 4 decades. Hey, at least SOMETHING good came out of that.

At home I don't have any kind of prayer routine, which could actually explain how I've been feeling lately...

Sorry for the downer comment. I should probably try to pray a Hail Mary now or something.