PRACTICAL STEPS: Dividing Responsibilities

Tagging on to this morning's post about RESISTING DIVISION IN YOUR HOME, here's some simple, and oh so practical application (especially for young couples).  If you keep tripping over the division of responsibilities, try this:  Sit down and talk through it...calmly.  Write it down on paper if you need to – not so you have a contract - but a basis for discussion:

1. This is what I’m good at. This is what you’re good at
2. This is what’s easy for me to do. This is what’s easy for you to do.
3. This is what I’m willing to do, even though I don’t like it.  This is what you’re willing to do even though you don’t like it.

Then use that information as a baseline for developing realistic expectations about each person’s contribution in the home.  It may be an easy and even pleasurable thing for you to handle the yard work.  For your partner it may be massive brain damage to crank a mower.  It’s not a male/female thing.  It’s a gifts, talents, and abilities thing.

As we begin to divide up tasks based on what we can each handle effectively – not based on an EQUAL DISTRIBUTION – then we find that our homes begin to operate more smoothly.  We become more effective in the routine tasks, allowing more time together for the important stuff.  We can pull together in unity, rather than being divided by disagreement.  This may sound like really simple stuff.  But relationships crumble every day over simple stuff.  Let’s not ignore the obvious, just because it’s obvious.  Try it.