How to Apply the 10/30 Rule to Cleaning
January 23, 2023
Are you trying to be more organized and you’re not sure how to go about it? Maybe you’re tired of seeing your home looking a mess and you’d like to make some changes so that it stays neater.
There is a rule you may have heard of known as the 10/30 rule that is very helpful as a mantra if you’re trying to accomplish more and stay more organized. It is a rule that is often applied to the workplace to help you excel, succeed, and pave the way for you to advance. It can be used in your daily house chores as well, though.
What Is the 10/30 Rule?
This rule can be adapted many different ways, but for our purposes in talking about keeping a cleaner home, the rule says that you take 10 extra steps to finish a project or to do something correctly rather than taking a shortcut. The second part of the rule is that you take 30 extra seconds to do something the right way rather than trying to get done as quickly as possible.
It’s a rule that can be applied to many different aspects of your life and help you keep things more organized and achieve greater success. It helps you perfect what you do and do things better than you normally would. By keeping this rule in mind and using it as a daily mantra, you can improve in every aspect of your life.
If you follow this rule as it is intended, you will spend more time doing things properly. It doesn’t add a lot of extra time to your chores, but it encourages you to take the extra needed time to do things in a way that gives you the best results.
Let’s talk about how you can put this rule into practice for house chores so that your home looks cleaner, has fewer pests, and is easier to keep clean.
10/30 and Laundry
This is a great rule to use when you’re dealing with your laundry every week. Instead of putting things off and procrastinating, you can spend a little bit extra time and put in a little extra effort to get the laundry done more efficiently. If you’re willing to take a few extra steps to take dirty clothes in the laundry room and put them into the washer, you’ll find that your laundry gets done earlier in the week. This will keep it from piling up as much.
If you take 30 extra seconds to deal with the laundry, you can use that time to fold some clothes or put them away rather than let them pile up and wait to be done when you have more time. Using the 10/30 rule frees up some of your time that you normally wouldn’t give yourself for laundry and other household chores.
10/30 and Dishes
This is one of the areas of house cleaning where people notice a big difference with the 10/30 rule in action. By taking those ten extra steps, you have the opportunity to put dishes away once they are dry and take dishes from around the kitchen and the house and put them into the sink.
By taking 30 extra seconds, you can wash up dishes as soon as they are dirty rather than waiting for them to pile up and get out of hand. By cleaning the dishes sooner, right after you eat, they are much easier to clean. This ensures that food on the plate does not have time to harden and become difficult to clean.
10/30 and the Floors
Does it constantly feel like your floors are dusty and in need of sweeping but you simply don’t have the time to keep them clean? By enacting the 10/30 rule, you can sweep your floors when you notice they’re dirty rather than telling yourself you’ll save the job for later. When you do sweep, by forcing yourself to spend 30 extra seconds, you will be able to do a better job and leave less sweeping for later.
When it comes to vacuuming, spending an extra 30 seconds in each room will help to keep those rooms looking tidier and prevent dust and dirt from building up. A thorough job of vacuuming protects your rugs and cuts down on friction, so there’s some long-term value to be had from putting this rule in action for vacuuming.
Do you find yourself rushing through the task of mopping your floors? The 10/30 rule will help you to focus on what you’re doing and spend the extra needed time to do a good job, mopping in all the corners and mopping evenly across the floor. You may not always have time to do the kind of cleaning work you want. Even with an extra 10 steps and 30 seconds for each task, you may find yourself overwhelmed by the housework. It’s okay to hire a company to do some of the house chores. Leave the big jobs to the professionals or bring them in every so often to help you keep things under control. With the 10/30 rule, though, you can be more productive on your own and have less catching up to do throughout the week and the month.
10/30 and the Dusting
Not many people like to dust, but that is one of those jobs where the dirtiness really builds up in visible ways when you don’t take the time to do it properly and regularly. If you apply the 10/30 cleaning rule to dusting, you will take the extra time to clean in those out-of-the-way places and clean extra thoroughly where you would normally speed through the chore. Just keep this rule in mind as you work, and you will be motivated to do a bit more and go a bit further. Then, you can look back on the job when it is done and be able to feel good about what you have accomplished. You will know that you took the time to do things well and did not cut any corners.
Be a Productivity Master
You can spend your time more wisely by using the 10/30 rule and other productivity hacks to get the most out of your time and train yourself to not cut corners. You can get more done, see better results, and be more satisfied with the work you do. Your home does not have to be an out-of-control mess. You can get a handle on the chores that need to be done by putting this simple productivity rule into action.