Laundry Lessons

My husband jokes that my favorite room in our house is the laundry room.

I do spend a lot of time there. I like to keep things rotating in and out of it. I find fulfillment in keeping clothes and other items clean for my family. And when I’m standing in there with the machines running, I can’t really hear anything else but my own thoughts. 

So, it comes as no surprise, when our washing machine recently broke down, I was perturbed. When it took eight days for a repairman to come to our house, I was grumpy. And when it took nearly five weeks for the part to arrive and the washer to get fixed, I had run the gamut of frustrated emotions. 

Appliances are an amazing convenience that we often take for granted…until they break down. Some of you may have welcomed the respite from a nonfunctioning washing machine. I, admittedly, experienced somewhat of a sense of loss. I’m not a dramatic person; I tend not to carry a wide band of emotions, but this washing machine debacle was really taking me to a level of annoyance that I hadn’t experienced in a while.

I knew it shouldn’t have bothered me so much. I’m fortunate to have this problem, I told myself. Not a big deal in the whole scheme of life, I repeated. But, it was arguably an inconvenience.

So for nearly five weeks without a working washing machine at our house, I felt like I was on a constant course-correction. I’d get sucked into the irritation of having to travel and do laundry at odd times of the day and night; I’d recognize it, and have to pull myself out of that feeling. It was actually a good cycle to learn from and learn to repeat.

During my washing machine “desert,” I was given the opportunity to practice responding to inconvenience. This laundry lesson really made me step back and think about how I need to seek course-correction when I start to go down a path of frustration or irritation when something in life is inconvenient.  

How can I better weather life’s inconveniences? 

Self-awareness - During this laundry lesson, I saw and felt myself getting irritated and grumpy. I knew I had lost my cool one morning on a laundry run when even the greetings of Socks the friendly cat got under my skin.

Measure it - A broken wash machine is not that big of a deal. I had to make the situation less about me and my inconvenience. I like to say that pronouns can be dangerous when we use too many I’s and me’s.

Self-control - Self-control was achieved by course-correcting to more virtuous thoughts and actions. Turning to God’s grace and personal gratitude in times of inconvenience really helps me snap out of holding on to frustration.

I’m obviously still working on gracefully getting through life’s inconveniences. Frustrating and unplanned detours in our day will continue to occur. When they happen, may we be led on a course-correction that is guided by God’s grace. Working through the smaller things in life, like a laundry lesson, can help lead us to greater freedom and the ability to navigate other challenges more gracefully.

P.S. I'm grateful for a functioning washing machine. :)