It's Time for a Deep Clean

Because perhaps our lives are dirtier than meets the eye

This past weekend my husband and I hosted an end-of-summer cookout at our home. We welcomed friends new and old for good food, drinks, laughs, and overly competitive beer pong games. Seeing so much of our community in one place at one time was a perfectly orchestrated summer send-off. With so much happening in our lives, I’m grateful that we, and our guests, prioritized community and fellowship over our busy schedules.

image: a post-cookout mirror pic

After a night of grilled bites and summer spritzes, Sunday left us facing the not-so-fun part of hosting: the cleanup. We were on our way back home from church Sunday morning when my husband and I decided that we’d divide and conquer: he’d handle the lower level and and I’d tackle our routine weekly cleaning upstairs.

I started in one of our bathrooms and impulsively decided to reorganize all of our storage. I quickly found myself in a groove — emptying drawers, sorting cabinet space, taking inventory as I went. It was an unanticipated bonus before my usual deep clean. After neatly returning all of our bathroom items to their designated place, I decided to move onto the shower next.

Roll Up Those Sleeves

Before I began, our shower didn’t look dirty at all. In fact, I was so confident in how it appeared that I had shown it off to guests just hours prior, so its presentability was no surprise. But as I got to cleaning, scrubbing the tiles high and low, the more I actively searched for grime the more I found. Dirt hid in tiny grooves and corners you’d never notice at first glance, or even with brief moments in the shower.

As I worked tirelessly to reveal bright white tiles, it struck me how much this parallels us as humans: we’re often a little dirtier than meets the eye. Most of us don’t know it because we’re not bending down, looking closely, or searching those nooks and crannies of our lives where our own gunk could accumulate. And if we never do the deep cleaning, let alone some form of weekly maintenance, it’s no surprise that these build ups go undiscovered.

Deep cleaning takes work. In the shower it shows up as sweat and fatigue; in our own lives it’s hard truths and intense emotions. And unlike the shower where you can simply rinse away what you find, we’re often left confronting the grime in our own worlds: the ugly parts of ourselves we almost wish we didn’t find. It’s uncomfortable. And for many of us it’s far from enjoyable. But like our desires with our routine cleaning schedules, it’s the only way to reveal the most polished version of ourselves. So how can we ensure that we’re living a Mr. Clean worthy life? From my experience it helps to focus on a few things:

1. Cleaning Cadence

   The only way to ensure my shower never looks grimy would be to clean it daily. Overkill? Maybe. But the level of cleanliness ultimately matches the amount of work I’m willing to put in. In the same way, small daily practices — self awareness exercises, prayer, journaling and honest self-reflection — make our internal “cleaning” easier and prevent buildup.

2. Cleaning Catalysts

   A deep clean isn’t the same as a quick wipe-down. You need the right tools to do the job well — whether that’s therapy, spiritual discipline, or hard but honest conversations with trusted friends. If you want different results, it’s probably time to ditch the cute clean and really get down and dirty.

3. Cleaning Community

   Support matters. This isn’t trauma-bonding or leaning on someone as a crutch, but having someone who’s also “cleaning” who can keep you accountable. My husband and I set our cleaning goals and worked independently. It felt good to know that while I was scrubbing the shower, he was scrubbing the floors — two people working separately but moving toward the same goal.

Happy Cleaning

Marriage, for many of us, is a deep clean. It forces you and your spouse to examine one another closely. Spend enough time together and you’ll find the dirt — but what you’re really cleaning is the residue that was already there.

What if we don’t wait for someone else to come in and tell us we missed a spot? How cool would it be to crouch down, bend over, and sweat a little to reveal the most polished version of ourselves, even when no one is looking?

Chances are you’re clean enough to impress visitors for a short period of time. But if someone stuck around and really examined you, what would they find?

Thank you so much for reading.

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