At some point in my house’s 112-year history, someone installed thick, white, nine-inch high baseboards that mostly act as highly visible shelves for dirt.
Whenever I try to clean these baseboards, I quickly get annoyed and discouraged. There are seemingly miles of them, running in and out of closets, behind furniture, and underneath power cords and dangling spider plants.
Unlike sweeping, vacuuming, or dishwashing, there’s no stable posture from which to clean baseboards. It’s always an act of ongoing contortion. Each obstacle interrupts the flow of what is already an awkward task.
The other day, however, I cleaned my office, including its baseboards, with none of the usual struggle. The difference was that this time I cleaned them without the entering the psychological state of trying to clean them. I skipped the whole idea of trying.
Read More
I'm David, and Raptitude is a blog about getting better at being human -- things we can do to improve our lives today.
I want to try this experiment. I find it very difficult to start and maintain habits over time, so, maybe having you and others doing this at the same time will help me. I'll be happy if I manage even 5 minutes of Stoicism a day. Unrelated to this, I...