Be devoted to one another in love. Honour one another above yourselves.
Romans 12:10
I am tackling a tricky topic today and that is, how to serve joyfully. I’m speaking to homemakers and mothers because I know it’s often women who are juggling the entire’s family needs and schedules, and I know how trying and tiring this is. I have had the advantage over twenty years of watching women do this and listening to their stories, and throughout most of that twenty years I was not a homemaker or mother myself.
What I noticed was women burning themselves out. Working all day, coming home and doing all of the cooking, cleaning, activity events with their kids, managing kids’ lunches and play dates and academic lives. And what I saw shining out of all of them was sheer exhaustion and defeat. They had too much to do, no one to help them and there was never a pause. Never a break. But none of them saw any way out of it. They wanted their kids to play soccer or hockey or whatever, and they couldn’t avoid the baby showers and birthday parties of close friends and family members. They just had to keep going. One woman called going home at the end of the day her “second shift.”
I was single, and I thought, these women are all insane.
I lived a leisurely life. I went home and I would make my humble supper that pleased me and then I could do whatever I liked for the rest of the evening. Crochet, watch my favourite TV shows, have dinner out with a friend–whatever I wanted. Disclaimer: I lived a very dull life. I would go home and rest and indulge in my hobbies and go to bed by 10pm because even though I was single, I was stressed out in the ways that single people are stressed out, and I’ve always been a homebody.
But my point is: those women were living on a hamster wheel and I promised myself I would not when I married.
God works in mysterious ways because I don’t live on a hamster wheel. I learned to serve joyfully.
For the first two to three years of my marriage, I did sometimes feel as though all the cleaning and cooking was drudgery and I resented it. And then I had a mindset shift.
I began to see all the things I did–the endless loads of laundry, the cooking, the dishes and everything else as acts of love rather than acts of servitude I was forced to provide my family because there was no one else to do these tasks. That mindset shift brought joy into my dishwashing and dusting and cooking. I love my family. I was honouring them by providing them with a clean home and good meals. I was providing them with things that money cannot buy, love poured into each act.
Each made bed, each meal cooked, each dish washed, each time the laundry is washed, each time the junk drawer is decluttered and organized, all of this honours the home and those who live it, your family.
I had never, ever in my whole life, thought about cooking and cleaning as acts of love. And thinking like this filled those tasks which I had hated and found tiresome and resented, with love and joy.
Simple Ways to Serve with Joy
Having a mindset shift was the first step for me, but I had to dig a little deeper to really find the joy in cleaning toilets. Because there are always going to be some things you just hate doing around the house, for whatever reason.
But here is what helped me:
- getting creative with my cooking. I decided to really get into the kitchen and turn some of my favourite meals into healthier versions of themselves.
- praying as you work. Say a prayer as you toss your children’s clothes into the laundry machine. Pray for them to grow in faith, or for a specific need.
- matching tasks to your energy level. Don’t tackle a spring clean on a day when you feel exhausted or have a cold. Take breaks between tasks.
- balance homemaking with fun. Fun can be playing with your little one, or a gab with a girlfriend or it could be something more low key–a cup of tea, a half hour reading.
- realize that the housekeeping can sometimes wait. Time with your family is far more important than getting every pillow fluffed.
- understand that schedules and rhythms change. What worked for several months might need adjusting as you move from winter into spring or your little ones grow and begin school.
- don’t compare. Your home is not an Instagram home. It’s not your friend’s home. It’s yours and needs to reflect your family, not a Instagram aesthetic or a style that your friends have.
Living with Joy
Once I learned to tackle all the housekeeping and homemaking in a new way, it reduced my fatigue and my relationship with my husband even improved. Not because he had wanted me to be a traditional wife and mother, but because he was grateful that the home was orderly and that I was happier. I was happier too because I was proud to be providing my family a cozy home that we could happily live in, feel at peace in and build memories in. It became what I wanted to do with my time–finding new ways to organize closets and new recipes to make, planting herbs to flavour our food with and making heirloom pieces with my crochet hook. I was serving my home with joy and it made life itself more joyful.
Homemaking is now my first job. I work full time as a teacher, and when I’m at work, I’m pretty dedicated to all my students. But my home and family is my first job, the one that I know is most important.
Friends, I hope I’ve helped you in finding ways to serve your home with joy today and maybe even helped you shift your own mindset and approach to your home and family.
How do you serve your home with joy? Share in the comments!