Switching From Auto-Pilot

 

Have you ever noticed how washing machines have changed a lot over time, but dryers really haven’t? I guess if you spend enough time around these appliances you eventually come up with this level of brilliant observation.

 

My mom might correct me on this, but I feel like at some point we had a ringer washer – or maybe I just saw one on an episode of Leave It To Beaver. I know we had a spinner washer, where you washed stuff in one bin and then put it in a separate bin to spin out the water. This was before safety features were much of a thing, and I remember my mom’s dire warnings by way of a tale of some woman whose arm was allegedly torn clean off because she reached in before it stopped spinning. I feel that this may be partly why I have an aversion to laundry, even to this day.

 

Then we got an automatic washer – took less time, used more water. Now we have a High Efficiency washer – takes more time, uses less water.

 

The electric dryer style really hasn’t changed. Nor has the solar powered dryer in the back yard. I have to confess, I don’t use this one as much as I should. It has to be a day when I’m actually home, and it’s not too humid, but warm and windy – but not too dry, or a south wind, or else the dust from the road leaves my towels dirtier than before they were washed. So yeah, that’s not too often. Sorry, Mother Nature – I’m trying.

 

We have had the clothesline in the back yard forever. But last fall, the line tore and has not been fixed. I’m thinking it had something to do with the roll bar on the yard tractor… but we won’t name names.

 

So the poles are there, but even though there’s no line, every time I walk between them, I duck my head. Every. Single. Time. A lifetime of not wanting to get clothes-lined makes me switch to some kind of auto-pilot limbo.

 

I operate on auto-pilot a lot.The other day, we were expecting company and I instinctively started fretting about the condition of the house. Until I stopped and remembered that domestic self-consciousness is actually not so much of an issue for me anymore – the anxiety was just a force of habit. That awareness freed me up to stop shoving dirty dishes under the couch and also maybe quit yelling at everyone.

 

Or when I’m anxious or irritated or anything, and what starts out as a legitimate plate of nachos turns into…. Well, the last thing I remember was making eye contact with the brownies, and the next thing I knew, I woke up on the couch with crumbs my chest.

 

But once in a very blue moon I am able to interrupt my brain’s auto-pilot and switch over to manual, or awareness. To stop. To breathe. To think.

 

It has been said that 90 percent of people seem to live 90 percent of their lives on auto-pilot, which is to be unconscious. I would say most of my life I’ve been above average in this. Finally! Something I excel at! Shoot. It’s not really anything helpful.

 

But it is possible to let this go, and for me it has to do with being still. Stillness seems to be a four-letter word for us these days. It’s hard, because we just don’t give ourselves time for it. Or we can’t stand to hear our own thoughts when we slow down enough to listen to them.

 

Over the last year I’ve made a deliberate effort to be still. Before that, I couldn’t go for even a short run or walk or drive or sit without needing to distract myself with music or books or TV just to block out the craziness and meanness of my own thoughts. Until I figured out that those thoughts that were meant to, what… motivate? That they were not only unhelpful, but also full of baloney.

 

I started to read stuff on things like Centering Prayer and Meditation and a book called Seven Sacred Pauses by Macrina Wiederkehr. These ways of connecting with God were new to me, and some of my prayers started to be less about words and more about nearness. I started to practice being still – and it does take practice – sometimes I realize I just spent the last 5 minutes of my stillness wondering if anyone in this house will ever replace an empty toilet paper roll.

 

The good news is that it’s not ever about being perfect. It’s not an immediate turn-around, and it’s not about a focus on results. It’s about showing up, and showing up, and then after that showing up again.

 

And every once in a while – in a moment of anxiety or pain – that practice returns to me, and reminds me to switch from auto-pilot to awareness.

 

And every once in a while, I actually do it.