The laundry fix: a flywheel
How to move literal mountains (of laundry).
Today I’m introducing another Essential Concept in our repertoire of systems thinking concepts by way of this old timey invention:
This is a flywheel. Flywheels are incredible creations. In short: once they start spinning, they store energy and continue rotating on their own, without additional input, and can even later tap into the stored energy like a battery.
Flywheels make great metaphors. The business world LOVES the flywheel concept, which is how I initially came across it. Flywheels require a lot of work to get going, but once they start running, growth/success accelerates seemingly on its own. What’s not to love?
Ok so WTH does this have to do with organizing your house?
You can create flywheels in your home!
Here’s an example using our favorite nemesis: laundry.
I notice many of my 1:1 clients struggle with an abundance of clothing, often paired with a feeling of overwhelm when it comes to laundry. Unsurprisingly, these things are related. It’s not uncommon for laundry and clothes to permeate every single room of the house. Every single one. Do not stress if this is you — you’re not alone!
When I see this, I like to focus our efforts exclusively on clothes and laundry because once we get this system working, the whole house can start feeling much more manageable.
Here’s the secret to taming both problems at once.
The mountains-of-laundry challenge is the fault of what’s called a negative feedback loop. You don’t do your laundry and run out of clean clothes, so you buy more clothes, which then creates more laundry to do, which makes laundry feel unsurmountable, which leads to more clothing accumulation, etc. The system grinds to a halt.
To solve this, we need to get a positive feedback loop, aka a flywheel, going. Remember, flywheels require a lot of effort to begin, but once they’re running they self-perpetuate. Here’s what you do: