The Dishwashing Exercise

This is an exercise I suggest to my clients to help calm anxiety and encourage curiosity. If you’re anything like me, you have a few dirty dishes in the sink. Start washing them. Ground into your senses:

Sight: what’s in front of you? If there’s crud on the dishes, what does it look like? What else do you see? Notice the backsplash. What color are your dishes?

Smell: Do you notice a smell from the food on the dishes? From the soap? Do you have value judgments- do you find yourself liking or disliking what you smell?

Sound: What’s the sound of the water coming through the pipes? When the dish or sponge breaks the flow of the water, how does that change the sound? Do things clatter together as you move them to the drying rack? What other sounds can you hear in your home or from outside?

Sensation- skin: What’s the temperature of the water like? Do you feel a difference where the water hits your skin, vs. where your wet hands make contact with the air?

Sensation- movement:  As you move your hands, what tenses in your arms? Does the sponge catch on dish crud or does it move smoothly?

Sensation- posture: Can you feel your feet on the ground? How does it feel to stand this way right now? Then clue into other ways you might be experiencing the moment:

Thoughts: What’s coming up in your head right now? Do you think this exercise is lame or interesting? Are you remembering things that happened before or planning conversations or tasks for the future?

Emotions: What’s the quality of your emotional state right now? How does paying attention to sensations affect your feelings? 

Here’s why this is a goodie: practicing mindfulness helps put you in a state where you can organize your experience- even feelings or experiences that are way tougher and nastier than dirty dishes. Getting good at this in an “easy” context, like during chores, helps you to apply curiosity to more difficult situations in life. And at the end, you’ve got some clean dishes as a bonus.