Real Life: What Does it Actually Look Like?

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We don’t often talk about what real life looks like, do we?

On Facebook, we certainly don’t see people’s actual dirty laundry piled up, or a sink full of dirty dishes. There are days when it just doesn’t get done. Sometimes I might even have other things to do. Gasp, right?!

Real Life: What is Actually Looks Like

We see perfect. Or, shall I say, their picture of momentary perfection. A snapshot of time when everything is going right. When the counters are clean and all the kids have their hair combed (and no chocolate on their face).

How many of those snapshots do you get a day? A week? A month? When is real life ever truly perfect?

A few years ago, I stopped mindlessly browsing Pinterest. The unattainable perfection was making me unhappy. Like, really unhappy.

Let’s be real for a minute. 

If you knocked on my door right now, you’d see shoes piled at the front door. Coats, backpacks and basketball bags too, because the little people can’t seem to put the on the hooks right above where they dropped. Usually there’s a flute, but for the moment, it’s being stored at school. 

You would see the breakfast dishes still sitting on the table at 3pm. In our rush to get out the door this morning, they were left behind. You would see the dishes from dinner last night still in the sink, because the dishwasher was full and didn’t get run, and I had to leave before it was finished. You would see fingerprints on my refrigerator. 

You would see my bed unmade. In fact, I can say with certainty that my 13-year-old is the only one who consistently makes her bed, and even she forgot this morning. You would see clean laundry draped over my hope chest, waiting to be hung in the closet. You would see baskets of clean laundry in each of the kids rooms, waiting to be folded.

I see it, too. I really do. I try hard to keep things clean and tidy. I clean the bathrooms, but there still is the daily blue toothpaste trail in the kids bathroom. I vacuum, but my 5-year-old likes to jump on all the leaves she finds. I do laundry everyday, but somehow we keep needing to wear clothes. 

But today, I didn’t get the little jobs done. Today, I didn’t wipe the blue toothpaste out of the sink. Today, I didn’t vacuum the leaves for the 40th time this week. Today, I let it be. Tomorrow, I’ll tackle it.

My real life isn’t perfect. 

What does your real life look like?

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