Clutterbug - Real-Life Hacks and Tips to Declutter, Organize and Clean your Home Fast - Project vs Routine - The Secret to Real Growth | Clutterbug Podcast # 186

Episode Date: August 14, 2023

In today's podcast, I chat about routines versus daily projects and how they can impact our personal growth.  I share some of my experiences of how I turned my daily projects into routines of success.  Together let's push the needle forward and unlock our full potential!   You can find more Clutterbug content here: Website: http://www.clutterbug.me YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clutterbug TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clutterbug_me Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clutterbug_me/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Clutterbug.Me/   #clutterbug #podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For me, I think knowing the difference between routines and projects in my day-to-day life, in my weekly life, and my monthly life have really made a really huge impact on the results that I'm getting. So I want to talk about the difference of those right now. Hey, Clutterbugs, welcome back to the Clutterbug podcast. You know that I am a junkie for all things, self-help. I don't know why. It's addicting. And we've talked about this so many times in past episodes, but I'm always on the hunt for this one, like,

magic tidbit of information that is going to make my life better than it was yesterday. And I'm also lazy. So I don't want to have to necessarily work hard for these tidbits of information. And so self-help books, they give me motivation, but they also give me knowledge or wisdom that I didn't have. That being said, for as much as I've concerned, you think I'd be a better person. It's a slow, gradual climb and sometimes I slide back down the mountain. Right now, I'm not at my peak and that's okay. But I am still continually moving the needle forward. And so I think about this because I talk to a lot of people. I'm doing coaching and trying

to help people succeed, not only in getting their home organized and decluttered and tidy, but it always turns into so much more than that, helping people find motivation, helping people, yeah, feel that spark, right? How do we do that? How do we feel that spark and want to do things that make us proud? How do we achieve these big goals that we have for ourselves? And because I'm talking to so many people and because I'm always looking at my own life and trying to be better, have definitely noticed some little patterns, patterns of habits and routines and projects that people do that are kind of achieving the things that they want and the people who are not achieving the things that they want and the sort of lack of habits, routines, and projects. And so let's talk today about the really

big difference because I personally, this is just a personal opinion, but I think there's a huge difference between routine and project. And I think the secret is knowing that and making sure that we're doing both of these things. Aristotle once said, we are what we repeatedly do. And habit, it is. It's like an unconscious action. It's something that we just do without really thinking about over and over and over again. And these are the things that shape our life. these are the things that make us who we are. And so if we get up and go to the gym every morning and that's a habit, guess what? We're probably a fit and healthy person. If we're in the habit of decluttering and tidying on a regular basis, we are probably an organized tidy person who lives

in a tidy home. We are what we do on a regular basis. But I also think there's some kind of like stagnantness. I don't know if that's a word, but you can kind of stall when it comes to habits. And I definitely saw this in myself. I was doing the same thing every day and I was having success, but it wasn't growth, if this makes sense. So routine for me is definitely the secret to just like making my life feel effortless. And it always started out as small things. Like I made a commitment into myself. I wasn't going to go to bed without making sure the dishes were done. And no matter what, like, this is a non-negotiable for me. It used to not be. All right. I used to have like a bathtub full of dishes. I used to hide dirty dishes in the stove and melt them. And inside, I had like

cooked chicken stuck to pants inside cabinets. That's really mortifying. I had bugs. I had all the gross things. So I'm not here judging or anything. I'm just saying, When I started really just getting sick of living like that, I had to have this all or nothing mentality no matter what I'm not going to bed without doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen. Because if I gave myself an inch, I would take a mile. If I was like, oh, maybe I'll do it tomorrow. Then guess what? I'm going to say that again the next day and the next day and the next day.

I have to be tough. I have to have no matter what non-negotiable. I'm allergic. I will die. The walls will cave in and crush me if I do not do the dishes and clean the kitchen before bed. And once that became really easy, at first it was not. It was horrible. I had to push myself. It was like the worst thing ever. It felt like an absolute chore. But eventually that which started out as a project, became a routine, became this unconscious habit. And so here is what I want to talk about today. When we want to start something new, we have to kind of think of it as a project. And when we repeat that or do that until it feels effortless, until we start creating it as a habit,

we can't just stop there. You know what I'm saying? We can't be like, yes, I do the dishes every day. I have this great new habit. And now I'm an amazing person. That feels effortless. And everything is awesome. Let's just ride off into the sunset and not do anything else.

And so for my own life, I really started doing this thing where I always had or wanted to have a new project on the go every day. And I wasn't even like, this wasn't even a conscious thing at first. It was always like, what am I doing today? What am I getting done today? How am I pushing the needle forward today? What's my one thing today that I'm doing? But those one things don't count the routine. What one project am I doing today that isn't the routine?

that I should be doing. So I'm going to talk about my routines and some examples of projects because I think if you start looking at your own life, not just your home and cleaning, but your life in these like two buckets, right? And knowing that every day we have to fill both buckets, you're going to see that you're going to like jump ahead. You're going to take a shortcut.

You're going to take the speedy fast train to the next stop in life. to where you want to be. You're going to be closer because this is kind of a shortcut. So routines are the things that we should be doing or we want to do on a regular basis that becomes kind of effortless. Sometimes they take effort friends, but there are things that we just have. It's rinse and repeat. We do all the time. We just should do them all the time. examples my daily non-negotiable routines dishes laundry tidy up just like a 15 minute tidy up and meals i got to feed my family i don't always want to but i got to feed them something even if it's just crackers and cheese friends i got to feed them so those four and i got to feed myself

so those four things are basically like my daily non-negotiable routines then And on top of that, I have like weekly non-negotiables. I got to clean the bathrooms at least once a week or have somebody clean the bathrooms like my kids. My husband, he wouldn't touch a toilet with a 10-foot pole. But my kids, I make them clean the bathrooms or myself, we got a vacuum. We have to dust. We have to like spot mop. We clean non-negotiables. We should change our sheets. I don't always. We should change our hand towels. I don't know. always. But these are like non-negotiables. I do not consider these projects. I'm not going to pat myself on the back and throw myself a party. These are not like, these are not like life accomplishments.

In the beginning they were when I wasn't doing these things. These were projects and I threw myself a freaking party. But now when I load the dishwasher, that's like, of course you are because that is what you do. You are a person who loads the dishwasher. And I think real growth comes when we add a new routine and we immediately also start a new project. And so when I started this journey, I sucked at all things and I started with one project until it became a routine and then added another and added another and added another. But knowing this and really focusing not so much on the routines, but on the projects and what projects am I doing today has really, is really just dragged me forward in life. And I'm not like out in front running and winning any awards

over here, friends. That's not what I'm saying. But let me tell you, I am way further ahead than I thought I would be and probably further ahead than I should be. And it is this mentality of every day doing a project, even a baby project, but something. What's my one thing today that's going to push the needle forward? And some of those projects turn in to routine. And when they start feeling like that effortless, I immediately add a new project, something that I'm not used to doing, something that's different, something that's above and beyond, something that's pushing me a little bit out of my comfort zone because either I'm learning something new

or it kind of sucks. It sucks donkey balls a little bit. You know what I'm trying? It's, I'm pushing myself every day. Okay. So here is some like baby micro projects, specifically pertaining to your home. And while you're listening to this podcast, I want you to pick one of these baby projects, and I want you to do it right this minute. Okay. A baby project would be like purposely going around and scrubbing all the scuffs off your walls. Like you're just looking for scuffs on the walls. You're looking for like handprints.

You're looking for things that you wouldn't normally look for in your day-to-day cleaning. Grab a magic eraser or grab a multi-purpose cleaner and a cloth and just go around and scrub all the scuffs. Look at your trim around your doors. Do you have sticky fingerprints by the doorknobs? What about buyer on the actual door by your doorknobs? What about your doorknobes? What about your fridge handle? Let's look for this stuff and make this a project.

You can do this in like 15 minutes. Go around your house, focus, your laser focused on one specific project. Touching up paint is another really cool project. So look around your house, it's usually like door trim and doors or baseboards that kind of get really scuffed. It's the white. You can just get yourself a little can of door and trim white paint. You probably already have a can in your house. Grab a little baby paintbrush.

go to the dollar store if you don't have any like i'm talking baby paint brushes right we're not repainting this crap we're touching it up and that's a project for today and you might be thinking well these are dumb and these aren't like going to make a difference but this is like a daily project that you can do in a few minutes and they add up and decluttering is a project it can also be routine. So I change over my clothing and my kids' clothing seasonally, right? But I still count that as a project because it's like a bigger thing. It isn't something that I would do on a normal basis. It's a project. It's like, what am I doing today? I'm not saying today, I'm not doing dishes. I'm not vacuuming. I am doing those things. But that's not the thing that's moving the

needle forward. That's not my big project for the day. And I try to live my life every day doing one of these bigger or baby, but doing a project. And I'm telling you, I'm telling you, I'm telling you, this has been a huge secret for success for me. This has been the one thing. If I really had to think about it like man the one thing that has helped me achieve huge huge things in my life. I want to take a second to thank today's podcast sponsor. Fall is right around the corner of you guys. It's creeping up. It's crazy pants. It's busy and my kids are back into sports. And so I'm extra grateful for Hello Fresh this time of year. I kind of get sad when summer ends and I definitely like, I definitely don't want to be in the kitchen cooking. So I'm so appreciative that

every week, I get three wholesome homemade meal kits delivered to my door. It's only three, but it stops me from getting takeout. And it's fast. It's easy. There's step-by-step instructions. I don't have to go to the grocery store. I don't have to plan because these meals, these kits are put together, all the ingredients, everything's pre-portioned. I just follow the instructions and put it together. And they are amazing. We have enough to. do. We have back to school. We have just so much craziness coming in in the fall. And don't even get me started. Winter. Christmas is around the corner. Treat yourself to HelloFresh. I promise you it's way less money than you think. Go to hellofresh.com slash 50 clutter pod and use the code 50 clutter pod for 50%

off plus free shipping. That's hellofresh.com slash 50 clutter pod. And use the code for 50 clutterpod for 50% for 50% for and use 50 clutter pod for 50% off plus free shipping. I wanted to talk about this routine versus project mentality today because, again, this is coming up a lot in my life, especially I have two clients that I'm talking with. They're not decluttering clients. They're actually creating their own business. And I'm trying to help them get off the ground and grow their social media and learn how to do a website and just all the craziness that comes with starting a business. And they're overwhelmed

and they're spinning and they're like, oh my, there's so much to do. Where do I start? And I always find myself coming back to what's the one thing you're going to do today? What's the one thing you're going to check off your list? You don't have to think about all the things that need to be done. Just do one thing. Maybe today you do one webpage or today you make one. social media post or today you call and try to find one new client. I don't know what it is. Everybody's business is different, but I find this so helpful for the people that I'm working with. It kind of takes a lot of pressure off. It takes some of the overwhelm away because instead of thinking about all the things we want to do and all the things we want to be, it narrows it down to

just one, one project. But we're also not stalled because we're not just doing the things that we should be doing anyways. We're not just focusing on those basic non-negotiable tasks that keep us float, keep our head just barely above water. We're not just focused on treading here. We're focused on freaking swimming, man, a marathon. We're focused on getting out of the water, climbing a mountain. we're focused on going up, not just continuously staying where we are. And that's what routines do. They keep us where we are. They keep us from falling back down.

They keep us from sliding into like all the bad stuff where we used to be. Routines are the secret to success. But growth comes from projects. And a lot of those projects will turn into routines. In my own life, it was little things like, I'm going to do a video. I'm going to make a video this week. And that was like a big project. Now, doing a video a week is like nothing.

That's routine. That's basic. I have to do that. I don't count that as a project. I already do that. A podcast? I have to do a podcast every week. In the beginning, this was like a huge thing.

This was like a huge project. I had to learn how to do it and I had to research and had to figure it out. And recording a podcast and learning to do this was a huge thing. Now it's nothing. It's a big nothing burger. I've done it so many times. It's become a routine. And I don't count that anymore as a project.

And I added to the pile because it feels effortless now that I've done it so many times. The same as decluttering. The same as organizing. The same is all the things that I've been able to add in my life. even in like hobbies that I've learned and on skills that I've developed, all of those things started out as projects and have then moved over into the routine bucket. But focusing on this project bucket is definitely pushing me forward. And sometimes I don't have the capacity to do like really big projects right now is one of those things.

We're moving. I'm overwhelmed. I have three kids. They're involved in activities. They want rides everywhere because they think I'm some sort of family taxi. But I'm still like, I don't go to bed at night until I've done some sort of even baby project. Every single day I write myself a to-do list. And it's like I'm checking something off that isn't just the basics, that isn't those non-negotiable things I should be doing in life anyways.

I'm doing those things or trying to do those things because they keep me afloat. but how am I having growth? What am I doing to make myself really proud today? What am I doing to make myself better than the person I was yesterday? And maybe it's wiping light switches. That's fine. That's something I wouldn't normally do. That isn't part of my regular routine.

And therefore, I've pushed the needle forward. But you can even think bigger than that, bigger. What's a project? Not a huge project. This is the great thing about projects, too. You can take like a huge project and break it down into mini baby projects. But something, every day doing one thing really is the secret. And I want you just to give this a thought.

While you're cleaning your house or just hanging out with me today, I want you to grab a piece of paper. And I want you to brain dump on one side of the paper, a lot of prong. a lot of project ideas. Just like write them down. I don't know what it is that you want to do. Organize a junk drawer. Maybe you want to reorganize your entire closet. Maybe you want to clean up the garage. Holy, that's a huge project. Don't do that all in one day. But maybe that's a project that you want to do. Maybe you want to start a book club or like a wine gathering with your friends, a weekly coffee date with your friends.

Maybe you want to start going to the movies, you know, the first Tuesday of every month with some of your best girlfriends. Or taking your kids and starting a really cool, regular thing that you do with them that isn't normal. I don't know what that is. Going to the park the last Friday of every month and having a picnic.

There's so many cool things that you can do. And those are the type of things I want you to brain dump as project. projects. And then every day, pick one. And if that's too big to do in a day, break it down and do a little piece of that project. And then when you've done brain dumping lots of cool things, I want you to flip that piece of paper over. And on the other side, I want you to write down your routines, those things that are non-negotiable. The daily routines, the things you want to do every day no matter freaking what your dishes is on there, no matter what you guys listen to me, you're doing your dishes. You are not going to bed with dirty dishes. You're just, you're not doing it.

And if there's a couple dishes in the sink, that's fine. If there's like, you've ran the dishwasher, you just have an empty that yet, you're going to do that in the morning, that's fine. This is not what I'm talking about. But you are not going to bed with the dinner dishes. still not done with those pots and pans and they're full of food. You're not. You're not allowed. You're not allowed to go to bed without that. That's a non-negotiable. And I think a quick tidy-up should be a non-negotiable too. Some people do laundry every week. Maybe that's a non-negotiable. I like to do it every day. You do you, boo. But write it down. Write those down. Those are the things that we have to make routine. And if they're not yet,

If they're not something that you do on a regular basis that you don't have to insanely force, that you're not skipping and procrastinating all the time, those are the projects you start with. Those are your projects until they become routine. Then they go in your routine bucket and you pick another project. But you start with those. And the crazy thing is your routine bucket's going to get full and heavy and nuts. but you're going to be able to handle it because you've added one at a time. And you see these people, right?

And they're like, they get up every morning and they run 5K and then they like go to work and they do boncadog's things and then they volunteer and then they go like painting or something and they're like still having time to chill with their spouse. And I don't know, it's crazy. It's like how do you get all that crap done in the day? How are you so insanely productive? They're filling their routine bucket. And how are they successful and continually pushing the needle forward?

They're adding projects. And when your routine bucket gets too heavy and too full, put some down. That's okay. It's okay to put those down sometimes. It's okay to pour some out of that bucket, especially if some of those routines don't fulfill you anymore or aren't like supporting you in whatever phase of life you are in. right now. There's going to come a point in my life where I'm not going to make podcasts and videos anymore, where I'm not going to write, where I'm not going to have all of the things going on,

when I'm not going to be running teenagers around, when I'm not going to be running them to all their different activities. And that's okay. Then I'm going to have room for some new stuff. And I'm going to find new projects that I can move over into routines. But I think the real secret comes from knowing the difference, having these separated, and knowing how both of these are equally important in our lives. Routines shape us. Routines make us who we are. Routines are the secret to success, but they can also make us stale if we're not adding new projects. if we're not continually growing. If I had stopped all those years ago at just doing the dishes and I was killing it and I was just doing the dishes and I was just tidying up and I wasn't trying anything new.

I never would have wrote books. I never would have learned how to do a website and code and learn all the HTML that I learned. I never would have learned to do podcasts. I never would have learned to like do all the cool. things that I've learned if I would have just stopped. I definitely wouldn't have started a business and started working with clients and discovered the four organizing styles. I would have been content with my bucket with a few routines in it and I would have went on with my life. It's focusing on the projects that made the big difference. And so what are you doing today to push the needle forward?

What are you doing today? Are you going to make a post and advertise yourself, put yourself out there? Are you going to declutter something big? Are you going to organize something? Are you going to reach out to friends and like start a fun thing? I don't know, a weekly like double date night. I'm throwing out ridiculous ideas. I have no notes for this podcast. I'm just totally winging it here. I'm just like talking off the top of my head. As you can probably tell. it's 10.30. I should probably go to bed. But listen, I do a podcast every week for you. That's a routine. It's a non-negotiable. Yeah. My project today, it was big. I did tons of projects today. I packed and I moved over boxes. And I refinished a table, which I was very excited about. And just so many cool new things that I'm doing. every day. There's something new that I'm doing. And I want you to do the same and feel the pride that comes from that. Thank you guys so, so much for listening. And I'll see you next time.