Cheryl Wright

Rules are im­por­tant for hap­pi­ness and har­mo­ny, wher­ev­er peo­ple live to­geth­er sim­ple home rules help to fos­ter love and re­spect for every­one un­der the same roof. What is the at­mos­phere in your home - chilly, tense, an­tag­o­nis­tic, every man for him­self? Are you won­der­ing what might help to change the cur­rent at­mos­phere and re-cre­ate the hap­pi­ness and har­mo­ny you once en­joyed?

Here's a list of com­mon home rules you can im­ple­ment in your own home.

Clean up af­ter your­self

As much as your fam­i­ly mem­bers love you, they get tired of be­ing your slave. If you leave-

• shoes by the front door, clean clothes on the bed and dirty clothes next to, in­stead of in the laun­dry bas­ket

• crumbs on the kitchen counter, on the floor, on the liv­ing room chairs

• scraps of food, dish­es in the kitchen sink

• hair and tooth­paste in the bath­room sink, the toi­let un­flushed, dirty show­er, wa­ter on the floor, wet tow­el on the floor or on the bed

• kitchen ap­pli­ances out, af­ter you use them

Then you are treat­ing fam­i­ly mem­bers as slaves, to clean up af­ter you. Change these habits.

Pull your weight

If you are shar­ing a home with oth­ers, do your part to make it a mag­net that draws every­one back, when they go out. So start think­ing about what you can do, to pull your weight. A house­hold al­ways has chores wait­ing in the wings to be done: laun­dry, dish­es to wash, floors to sweep, car­pet to vac­u­um, beds to make, stuff (toys, books, CD's, etc.) to or­gan­ise or put away, grass to cut, plants to wet, etc. Ex­am­ple: No one should have to deal with a dirty stove, dirty dish­es and a clut­tered coun­ter­top, be­fore prepar­ing a meal. Make sure the kitchen is ready for the per­son who does the bulk of the cook­ing. Some­times, pulling your weight means tak­ing the ini­tia­tive to arrange with some­one to do cer­tain chores on week­ends, month end and hol­i­days, such as; mov­ing the lawn, clean­ing the win­dows, pres­sure wash­ing the dri­ve­way, paint­ing ex­te­ri­or walls, etc. Re­sist the urge to dis­cuss who does the most, least, light­est or heav­i­est chores. While some­one is do­ing one chore, get busy do­ing an­oth­er.

Tone it down

Un­less your rooms have sound­proof­ing, re­duce the vol­ume on the tele­vi­sion, CD play­er, ra­dio, etc. Even if you can han­dle noise, at least be con­sid­er­ate of oth­ers in your home. Life at home should not come to a halt when you make or re­ceive a phone call. Fam­i­ly mem­bers de­serve to have the free­dom and com­fort to watch tele­vi­sion, speak to one an­oth­er, read or en­joy some qui­et time, even when you are on the phone.

Keep your busi­ness pri­vate

Avoid walk­ing from room to room, stand­ing on your front porch, or walk­ing back and forth on the street in front of your house, when you are talk­ing on your cell phone. Stop em­bar­rass­ing your fam­i­ly and an­noy­ing, amus­ing or shock­ing the neigh­bours with the dra­ma in your life. Stay in­doors, keep your con­ver­sa­tion "on the down low" and your busi­ness pri­vate. Of­ten, by the time a mar­riage, a fam­i­ly and a home dis­in­te­grates, no one re­mem­bers the gen­e­sis of the straw that broke the camel's back. Ex­am­ine your home life. Iden­ti­fy the lit­tle is­sues, habits and in­con­sid­er­ate ges­tures that might be caus­ing dis­com­fort and dishar­mo­ny. I have shared some com­mon home rules. To­geth­er with oth­er mem­bers of your house­hold, com­pile your own list, to help cre­ate a hap­py and har­mo­nious home.