Sadly, me complaining about it HIGHLY hypocritical. My room, at that age, was in a terrible state of affairs. As a kid, I was asked to clean my room frequently, which I did with the usual "make it visually clean," with lots of junk pushed under furniture or stacked in the closet. Thinking of my mental state at the time, and why I did this, I think could be broken down into the following thought process:
1. I did not understand WHY my room should be cleaned.
2. I did not want to spend time doing this when I could be doing other things.
3. I had to clean the rest of the house all the time, and my room was my vacation from that.
4. I always knew where everything was, anyway. The system sort of worked like "what I can reach I need, everything else under a pile or tossed aside."
5. Putting things away was often inconvenient. When I washed my clothes, for instance, they could stay in hampers. Folding them and putting them away was time consuming.
6. I had low self confidence and didn't care how I appeared to others.
7. My parents nagging me led me to subconsciously resist because I didn't like them very much, and had no desire to please them.
These things ended when I moved into my own room at the FanTek house. While my room was never "clean and neat," it never got as bad as it got back home. Then, people saw my room, and I gave a damn. Pride in my appearance and things just came on its own, when I was ready.
So, to my readers, please help me round out my perception of rooms.
1. Was your room usually messy or clean as a little kid?
2. Was your room usually messy or clean as a teen?
3. Did your parents make you clean you room at those ages? If so, what was the motivation/threat/bribe?
4. How do you/will you approach this with your kids? Obviously, if you never plan to have kids, you don't need to answer.
