Mundane but not boring

Madison O'Friel, Unsplash

I am a Learner. 

It is one of my top five strengths according to Gallup’s StrengthsFinder. Being a Learner helps me stave off boredom in situations where others may automatically reach for their phones, such as during unengaging conferences or sermons! Unlike my husband, whose bar for being intellectually stimulated is just too high, I find (almost) every experience an interesting opportunity for learning and growth. Some of you reading this may well resonate with a zest for learning, but others may be less so. Nevertheless, a Learner mindset can be developed - and it can enhance our lives as it helps us to become more intentional, discover joys and spark meaning - even in the mundane everyday happenings. Let me share what I have discovered! 

Paying attention to movements.

In my late teens, I remember sitting with friends, just passing time people-watching: commenting on their behaviours, laughing at, or secretly admiring them. 

For grown-ups with work and family responsibilities, this can seem to be a time-waster (or a luxury of time!). But we can extract some helpful elements of people-watching, and apply them in a meaningful way, such as: 

• paying attention to people moving around in our surroundings (this could be literal movements, or abstract ones, such as moving from one stage of life to the next);

• asking thoughtful questions about what may be driving people's actions and behaviours; and

• noticing our own internal shifts, that is, our own positive or negative reactions to people and examining why we respond the way we do.

A question that ties these elements together is: What do my observations tell me about myself? 

I frequently experienced this during the 16 months of maternity leave I took to care for Baby Z. Caring for a baby can be so mundane that many mothers cannot wait to get back to work after clearing the minimum period of their maternity leave. However, I genuinely enjoyed the 16 months I had, witnessing baby Z’s growth and my own growth as a mother. 

For example, when I had to troubleshoot and figure out why baby Z was refusing bottle-feeding, a key to addressing it was to pay attention firstly to how anxious I was about the situation.  Upon examining my anxious response, it revealed a strong need for control, which still requires God's ongoing gracious pruning and deep cleansing. And all throughout the year with Z, it was a joy documenting little steps of growth. My attentiveness to his daily movements reinforced my awareness of how I am a developer at heart. I naturally take note of and celebrate little successes. 

And so, as you think about your everyday interactions with loved ones, colleagues, and friends, or even “boring” social events you feel obliged to attend, such as weddings and extended family gatherings, perhaps you may learn something about yourself in the micro-moments of your own responses towards the people around you. 

Wander (and wonder) in the midst of routines. 

During my teens, I often took long bus rides where I would catch forty winks and still somehow magically wake up in time to get off at the right stop. The seemingly mundane nature of travel, chores or exercise also affords us opportunities for surprising insights.

It starts from the premise that “undemanding tasks allow the mind to wander where it will”. We know how chores like washing dishes, vacuuming the floor, and hanging laundry can be therapeutic. Doing a mindless task on auto-pilot that requires minimal attention can be pleasurable, because our thoughts can find the freedom to float in any direction. 

Let me elaborate with a personal example. Recently, I stuck a piece of masking tape onto the ears of Ellie, Z’s elephant soft toy, thinking I could remove it easily after using it as a temporary name tag. Note to self: never again.

I noticed how each individual thread of the soft toy was doggedly stuck to the tape, which multiplied the difficulty of peeling off the tape. And so, I had to painstakingly separate bits of tape a few threads at a time.

It was then that a thought came to mind about how people who were ‘stuck’ in their challenges, just like the threads stuck on the tape,  required individualised attention. I began to wonder how challenging it was for them to get out of their ‘stuckness’ of sinful or emotional baggage. This led to a conversation with God about a specific friend who was stuck in her problems, which evolved into intercession for her as I completed the task of freeing Ellie.

Ellie, Z's soft toy | Masking taped ear | Freed Ellie

What better way to pass the time in the midst of routines than to talk to God! In essence, that is prayer. At other times, we may also engage in an internal dialogue. In essence, that is reflection. 

These ‘wandering’ and ‘wondering’ conversations with self and God are great ways to learn insights in the midst of what might be considered mundane.

Experiment with outcomes in mind.

A final way is to ask: “What can I do differently?” This is especially helpful when it is your 112^th time changing diapers or washing your baby’s bum. 

But even more meaningful is to have some kind of bigger picture with which to make sense of the monotonous repetitive activity that you are engaged in. 

Caring for a child includes thinking about their development and what is helpful or needed. For Z and me, this required a big change in my approach at times, but at other times, all that was really needed were some simple adjustments. My initial overwhelming focus when feeding was to have Z finish as much milk as possible. But I wondered if feeding had other outcomes - and thought that getting him to communicate when he was hungry, and helping him to learn independent feeding skills were important too. So we experimented with a straw bottle for him to hold and created a cosy corner for him to associate milk with. Now that he is learning words, we are encouraging him to use proper words.

It is easy for a repetitive activity, whether it’s the umpteenth refinement of a PowerPoint, an exercise routine or a regular visit to an elderly relative, to be done more out of duty than delight. As beings who love novelty, we can get bored and get disinterested and uninvested. Yet if we could consider creative outcomes and step back to look at the larger picture, we may find fresh energy!

~~~~~

Rachel Naomi Remen, a Jewish physician, author and teacher, observed:

“It is said that the Christian mystic Theresa of Avila found difficulty at first in reconciling the vastness of the life of the spirit with the mundane tasks of her Carmelite convent: the washing of pots, the sweeping of floors, the folding of laundry. At some point of grace, the mundane became for her a sort of prayer, a way she could experience her ever-present connection to the divine pattern which is the source of life. She began to see the face of God in the folded sheets.”

Our mundane activities may indeed be a means to accessing a grace of divine connection with the One who brings meaning to all we do, and who writes a coherent curriculum out of all our experiences, ‘boring’ or otherwise. As we open our hearts to the invisible and imperceptible, may we experience a newness and freshness in our continued school of Life. 

Joanna is a wife to a man whom she was right to marry, a mother of a delightful 2 year-old and a co-labourer with the spiritual family at her church in this current season of life.