Just Fold the Dang Laundry

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

My blue laundry basket sits on my bed, full of clean clothes that I retrieved from the dryer earlier. I put it on the bed an hour ago to remind myself to put away the clothes before bedtime.

It’s now bedtime. And the laundry basket is sitting there. I stare at it. It stares back. It blows a razzberry at me.

I pick up the basket and move it to my desk chair. That’ll show it. I’ll fold it tomorrow evening.

Famous last words.

My clean laundry often sits in plastic baskets after I’m done putting it through the wash. Then I end up picking out daily outfits from the contents of the baskets rather than from my closet or dresser.

Because I'm not fond of the time-consuming process of putting away clean laundry.

Unfortunately, I also get regularly frustrated that I don’t have the motivation to “complete the cycle” of this chore.

I don’t like chores. Never have. It took me moving out of my parents’ house and living with a neatnik roommate to finally learn to completely clean up the kitchen before the end of each night (most of the time, anyway).

Why do I tell you these rather embarrassing personal facts?

Because I’m tired of living a life that I often feel is lacking in motivation. Fear of losing precious time to mundane, but necessary, activities prevents me from doing them when they need to be done. However, there are many other things in my life that are more notorious time-wasters than chores.

I’ve known many people who tell me they enjoy cleaning and keeping house as a form of stress relief, a way to exercise control over their environment when some other anxiety-inducing thing in their life is outside of their control.

I’ve never quite understood stress cleaning because doing chores has never been fun or stress-relieving for me. Quite the opposite.

But as I get older, that’s starting to change. The chore doesn’t have to be fun to be mentally helpful—a concept I’ve never truly grasped until recently.

As my dad would often say when I’d complain as a kid about having to do something hard or not-fun, “It builds character.”

This past weekend, I completely folded, hung up, and otherwise put away all my residual clean laundry for the first time in weeks.

It felt…good.

But I partly did it because I’ve been experiencing some stress and disappointment in my personal life and I wanted to do something mundane but useful (i.e. not bingeing TV or scrolling social media, because those things numb or mess with my feelings rather than helping me process them).

I realized that doing a chore and being satisfied by a job well done can help me constructively decompress and give me time to think deeply without just vegging out on the couch. I realized it’s useful to do something physical and utilitarian when I’m feeling trapped in my head, even if the activity is boring.

I know. Shocking!

But this changing attitude—which is also coming from long-term self-frustration—is an interesting phenomenon to observe. How many times have I told myself, “Just fold the dang laundry!”, then didn’t because I procrastinated?

I don’t know…too many.

But it’s entirely possible I won’t have to put up with the responsible part of my brain getting upset at the irresponsible part of my brain for much longer.

And maybe, just maybe, I’ll find that many of the things I procrastinate on—whether they be chores or constructive, life-giving hobbies—are more beneficial to my lifestyle and overall happiness than the things I do when I procrastinate!