I need to be part of this thread. I'm a messy.
In general, I'm ok with that. I'm ok with things when my house is cluttered but *safe*. I'm ok with having a house that looks like people live in it and USE it. I'm ok with my stove being dirty b/c I cook on it 3+ times a day. I'm ok with a semi-permanent scattering of toys set up in my daughter's room b/c "mommy, that's my tea party for my imagination friends. And that's my che-nickel set where I make my che-nickels. And this is the house we made for Nora's babies. And..." I'm ok with not being the kind of person who dusts regularly.
I'm ok with that.
What I'm not ok with is regularly paying late fees because bills we *can* pay got shuffled into a stack of mail we were avoiding. I'm not ok with things being lost or broken or being replaced unnecessarily because we couldn't find them, or they were in the way, or they got broken because they were poorly cared for. I'm not ok with not teaching my kids *how* to clean, or *why* it's good to clean. I'm not ok with the adversarial relationship I have with cleaning. I'd like to make it work FOR me instead of AGAINST me.
Most of all, I'm not ok with letting it always and ever stay in such a state that I honestly can't see the things that need help. I do not want my house to be like my mom's house. I don't want my kids to grow up in a house they just want to get away from b/c everything is messy and poorly cared for and breaking and unusable. I don't want them to grow up and resent coming back into that house the way that I sometimes do with my mom's house.