Making the Bed, Making a Change

Whenever I make the bed, I find myself thinking bad things about other people. Detailing what I don't like about a colleague's managerial style, listing the faults of my friends and relatives, thinking about something I heard on the news that rubbed me the wrong way. I don't know if it's the mindless nature of the task that gets my mind wandering, or if I subconsciously resent making the bed that gets me in a negative space, but I had to do something about it.

A few seasons ago, before the television writers' strike, there was a neat little show out called Life, and the main character had gone to prison and served a decade for a crime he didn't commit. During his sentence, he became fascinated with Zen Buddhism and other schools of focused thought. In one crucial episode, we find him standing in what seems to be a grave, digging it deeper, while the man who framed him sits by, tied up. We are led to believe he is digging a grave for this man. In fact, it is revealed that he is practicing an old Zen exercise, wherein you dig a hole, then fill it up. That's it. Dig the hole, fill it up. There is no purpose to digging the hole. You are not digging the hole IN ORDER to fill it up. You just do both things. Dig a hole, fill it up.

I don't know what it's supposed to do. Create calm, focus, mindfullness, mindlessness? What it has meant for me is streamlining, simplifying. That is to say, it cuts out the chatter in my mind. You have a task. Do it. Dig a hole. Fill it up. Even if that task is one that you will have to do over and over again. The bed gets messed up every day. Every day I make it. Why? That's easy. It's not a vital task, but a neat bed provides a more comfortable bedtime, as well as less visual chaos to disrupt the day. In the process of making it, if I can think about the task at hand while doing it, rather than drifting off to HaterLand, it's a nice bit of meditation as well.

Then, I take that phrase with me, throughout the day. There are many things that need to be done, many opportunities to let that negative chatter overwhelm us. But if I can know my task and complete it, that quiet that comes along is soothing and makes everything easier.

Dig a Hole. Fill it Up.