“Zen and the Art of Doing Laundry”
Meditations and Revelations During the Pandemic
Circles and cycles : literally, what goes around, comes...
Around, again and again. Dirty becomes clean. Clean becomes dirty. You begin to see the Zen in the art of doing laundry in the yin and the yang of laundry’s dualistic nature represented by degrees of wetness and dryness, and by the distinctions of darks and lights. You also begin to realize that circular motions define the wholeness of laundry.
Routines and rituals : wash and dry
Know that laundry is composed of clothes which are taken off your body, separated to be washed, and then, after drying, are combined to be worn again. The ritual of doing laundry reveals and affirms how you have chosen to present yourself to the world. This ritual, like all rituals, should not become a routine unless you know what it means.
Be the sock, be the sock : function and form coalesce
You are a certain shape and you perform a particular function. Learn the connection between your shape and your function to better fulfill your naturally given potential.
Folding as metaphor : natural state v. unnatural state
You impose order upon the natural movement toward entropy. Piles of clean laundry are a materially created world of crags, valleys, and ridges defining what appears to be empty amorphous space. Folding temporarily provides the illusion of control over this empty space.
Mindfulness : becoming aware...
That laundry is merely your clothes and, though they fit your body, you are not in them now, and they do not make you. You may create presences in a material world but you are mind, spirit, and energy.
Meld of humans and machines : new ways, old ways, impacts
New paths, such as dryers, are to be sought but not all new ways are the best ways to replace old paths; you may become lost or even destroy yourself if you stop questioning the use of progressive changes in your life.
Calming through sorting : recognizing patterns, accepting them
Knowing the world around you may bring great peace if you can accept the patterns of energy in which you live. Much of this you cannot change but you may find calm by becoming part of it. Especially if the pattern is argyle.
Missing pieces, matching pieces : incompleteness and completeness
Realize that sometimes there is no answer, not in logic or spirit, and accept that something is gone. It is missing from the picture you want to see as complete; this may mean you are imagining the wrong picture, or that you may always see and live in an incomplete picture.
Smells take you places : ethereal nature
The smells of laundry are like all smells: they rely on memories to exist and to have meaning. Smells are also living things in and of themselves; they represent a conjunction of what you were and what you are, where you have been and where you are now. They may be your most valuable sense in detecting the continuity of your soul.
Everything is clean, start over : rebirth, stains are gone
The idea that all you have worn can be washed and become clean is a tantalizing and, at times, healthy way to think about your life but it is also essential to remember that cleanliness is temporary. Some stains will never go away, and though you may be given a chance at rebirth, the seeds from which you spring will have come from your past.
Feeling done : there is more to do
You must put completed laundry away so that clean clothes are where they are meant to be when you need them to present your chosen self to the world. Realize that you will soil them again, thus simultaneously completing, and beginning, laundry’s life cycle.
Rick Doehring
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