Properly or not at all

Here's a plan you may recognise. The house has got away from you, so you decide that on Saturday you'll do the whole thing. Top to bottom, properly, with the good cloths. Because Saturday is coming, there's no sense in doing bits before then, and so Thursday's dishes wait for Saturday too.

Saturday comes. You have a slow start, the job looks enormous, and a friend suggests lunch. The plan moves to Sunday, and then to next weekend.

This belief flatters you, which is part of its appeal. "If I can't do it properly, I won't do it at all" sounds like high standards. But look at what the standard does in practice. It sets an entry price of three free hours and full energy. You almost never have those, and when you do, you want to spend them on something else. A standard that stops all work is doing the job of an excuse.

The plan also rests on a mistake about what housework is. It treats cleaning as a project with a finish line, after which the house is Done. But a home in use gets dirty at a steady rate. There's no finished state to reach, only upkeep, and upkeep works in small regular amounts. Think of brushing your teeth. Nobody skips it all week because they're planning a really thorough session on Sunday.

Once you see it as upkeep, the partial job stops looking pointless. If you wipe the counter and leave the floor, you have a wiped counter. If you wash half the dishes, tomorrow's washing up is half the size. If you put away only the clean clothes from the chair, the chair is holding a smaller pile. Each of those is a real improvement that you could have in the next five minutes.

"But the room still looks a mess afterwards, so what have I gained?" You've gained two things. The next session starts from a better position. And you've practised starting, which is the skill you're short of. You already know how to clean. What you haven't done much is begin without ceremony, do a bit, and stop.

Stopping deserves a mention, because the same belief causes trouble at the other end. Some people can't start a small tidy without it turning into a big one. You go to put a mug away, notice the state of the cupboard, and ninety minutes later you're sitting on the floor surrounded by every container you own. It feels productive. But your memory files the event under "tidying takes ninety minutes and wears me out", and next time the entry price has gone up again.

So a small job needs an end as well as a beginning. Wash the dishes, then leave the kitchen. The cupboard can have its own turn.