Someone spent a great deal of time coming up with a special holiday to celebrate 31 days of May. In order to do this they had to come up with each day representing a particular, but not necessarily, traditional holiday. This concept is similar to what the Baskin Robbins Ice Cream Company did when it came up with its 31 flavors – one flavor for each day of the month. The person who created 31 different holidays for the month of May had to have a creative sense of humor and maybe even a lot of time on their hands. They defined holidays like: Save the Rhino Day, International Tuba Day and even National Dance Like a Chicken Day. I did say someone who had time on their hands, didn’t I?
May 10 –Clean Up Your Room Day – is the official holiday for cleaning up our rooms and we can all take part in defining and planning a way to make a party out of this holiday. Parents, children, students, roommates, teachers and co-workers alike can all take part in observing this day. As long as we keep in mind the nature of a holiday – fun that is observed with family and friends – then we are on the right track for setting up our own Clean up Your Room Day celebration.
If you are a long-range planner, you know it is best not to break off more than you can chew and to keep your room and things in order all the time. So, be careful not to kill the holiday spirit by overwhelming family members, co-workers and friends with too much to chew or clean up – so to speak. Make a goal to start the celebration with food and drink, to have prizes or awards for the first done, the best work done, the most work done, the least work done etc. etc. etc., and concluding the celebration with more food and drink and the distribution of prizes or awards.
Think about beginning your holiday with a starting backwards strategy which entails looking around each room and putting things on the floor in their proper place. The kicker here is that someone may know that their clothes go in their drawers and not on the floor, so they stuff their clothes in drawers in any way. So, the judge for the celebration prizes or awards gives more points to the person who folded their clothes in their drawers and did not just stuff them. A similar situation occurs with closets. Some people pick up the things on their floor and throw them in their closet. Naughty, naughty! Throwing may count for one point in the final reckoning but hanging things up and putting them on shelves gets more points, thus a better prize.
The great thing about a Clean up Your Room Day is that everyone can participate. After-all, we all have stuff and we all need to put our stuff away even if we share a space with one other person or 10 others. A fun thing to think about doing when the celebration takes off is to turn on some catchy music and maybe even break into groups for specific shared areas. Making this fun and a group effort can be very rewarding as well as a relief for those co-inhabitants who haven’t picked up their stuff in months! Taking part in Clean up Your Room Day can give families, co-workers, roommates the opportunity to spend meaningful fun time together. Often families are moving at break neck speed and quality time is hard to come by. Is cleaning up your room quality time you ask? This author’s answer is yes! Having a clutter free, neat and organized room or home helps people to feel less stress, feel more at peace with one another and better able to perceive things in a “positive” way. Not to mention that most everyone likes a party with good food and games and camaraderie.
So as you take into consideration the importance of Clean Your Room Day and it’s potential benefits for your family, co-workers, roommate(s) remember to start the day off with food and then hold up your hand and say… “On Your Mark, Get Set, Get Ready, Clean!
