Kick Off Your Shoes And Get Comfortable!

I heard a funny joke the other day...

A newsletter subscriber said he expected his kids to not leave shoes lying around the house. The punch line was the subscriber was willing to keep himself miserable trying to get them to cooperate.

The same could be said for some people with their spouses. My experience is it’s not going to happen. It’s a joke. Kids are not going to take their shoes off in the family room and make the effort to pick them up and carry them into the other room and put them away properly. Especially if they are supposed to do so before they go back to the family room and finish what they were doing. It’s too much of a pain. Perhaps they’ll plan on putting the shoes away when they go to their room but their ability to carry out that plan usually falls short. In my home I’ve concluded that I can knock myself out and be angry all the time because they left their shoes out or I can organize my home in a manner that allows them to keep their habit of leaving their shoes out but keeps the home clutter free and organized in spite of that habit.

There is a principle you need to understand before you can appreciate my suggestion. It is the principle of problem ownership. If your kids leave their shoes out and you have to either pick up the shoes and travel to their rooms and put them away or you have to o battle your children over and over again then who owns the problem? Your kids gained the immediate reward of getting comfortable without effort. It doesn’t bother them if their shoes are cluttering the room. It only bothers you. You own the problem. As long as you are the one owning the problem the kids are never going to have any reason to change. You’ll want to switch that to where the kids own the problem and they are the ones who care if they left their shoes out. Not you. Then you’ll see the behavior changes. Besides, it’s no longer a problem for you even if they don’t change. You have given them problem ownership.

The other thing you need to understand is yelling at your kids or threatening your kids or bribing your kids does not give them problem ownership. It merely deteriorates the relationship between you and your children. It’s not until you take action and allow them to experience the natural consequences (not the pseudo consequences such as Mom or Dad getting angry) that the kids can and will take problem ownership. Don’t wait until you are full of intense emotion before you take action. Take action now before you get emotional about it. Then be sure you don’t rescue them from experiencing the full consequences of their choices and actions. They will try to get you to take back the problem ownership. Kids are good at that. Don’t buy it. Refuse to rescue them from experiencing the natural consequences.

What action should you take when it comes to kids leaving their shoes all over the house? How do you work with their habits so they get to keep their habits but your home stays organized and clutter free? How do you switch it so your kids are the ones with the problem and not you? Simply create a shoe depository in each room. Have one in every room.

Celeste emptied out a cabinet in one room and made it the home for wandering shoes. She installed a shoe organizer in another room’s closet. She purchased a large wicker basket with a lid for another room’s shoe depository etc. Each room has a home or an assigned location for “wandering shoes” to belong.

When shoes are left out don’t take them to a specific room to put them away. Just put them into the depository or “home” in the room where they were left out. Now when the kids want or need that pair of shoes again they’ll have to look in 12 or more shoe depositories to find where they left the shoes out. What a pain. It is now easier for you to put shoes away than it is for them to get them out. You now made the putting away process in as few of motions as possible. Your kids can choose to start putting their shoes away in their room so they don’t have to look all over the house to find them or they can spend their life looking in depositories. Either way they own the problem not you. Your home stays clutter free and organized. You don’t have to fight with your children anymore about putting their shoes away. You are able to sweep through the house and make it clutter free in just 10 minutes because you don’t have to travel to put wandering shoes away.

So establish a shoe depository for every room and then take your shoes off and relax. Your home will stay clutter free with the minimum amount of maintenance. You’ll have to discover something else to talk to your kids about rather than pick up your shoes and put them away. This may be the beginning of a beautiful relationship between you and your children.