The psychiatrist C. G. Jung believed caring for the home was deeply therapeutic, a kind of slow medicine that gave people a rest from their ambition and connected them to age-old patterns of renewal.
In the 1930s, Jung built a portion of his country house by hand, using tools designed in the Middle Ages. When in residence, he spent long hours in the kitchen, fanning the fire with leather bellows, and tending to his pots and pans, as analyst Marie-Louise von Franz recounts in the documentary Matter of Heart.
Elizabeth Osterman, an American colleague, visited Jung at his lake house in 1958, entering through a heavy wooden door in the middle of a thick stone wall. Inside she found a strong-bodied, white-haired 83-year-old in a green workman’s apron, chopping wood. “I have found the way to live here as part of nature, to live in my own time,” Jung told her. “People are always living as if something better is about to happen…They don’t think to live their lives!” (C.G. Jung Speaking, 162).
The father of evolutionary psychology, Jung felt that household tasks keep us human and keep us down to earth. In the mid-twentieth century, he worried about our addiction to speed and abstract thinking and warned us about the dangers of technology. In Memories, Dreams, and Reflections, he described his own antidote:
I have done without electricity , and tend the fireplace and stove myself. Evenings, I light the old lamps…I pump the water from the well. I chop the wood and cook the food. These simple acts make man simple, and how difficult it is to be simple!
Dependent on our new devices, we have less interaction with our physical environment. Instead, we spend the day crouched over a computer, expecting Alexa to order the groceries, Roomba to do the vacuuming, and GPS to guide the soon-to-be self-driving car. And instead of chopping, skinning, and sauteeing, we rely on Grubhub to deliver.
Yet here’s the funny thing: Housework provides a confirmation of our usefulness in a robot-driven world. While we’ve managed to automate everything from piloting a plane to building a truck, dusting and vacuuming are two of the tasks done best by hand! The reason: Scientists have been unable to create a bot with the right motor skills to deal with fragile objects or clean tight corners. I doubt then that it will be able to make the bed with tight hospital corners, or remove the dust from a carved mantel with a recycled toothbrush. In the age of “life hacks” You might well ask: Does anybody clean like this anymore? I’ll be there are more late-night cleaning rituals performed to soothe the soul than any of us can guess.
Remember, too, it’s just plain good for the body to get up and move. Cleaning is great exercise. When we put our soul in it, the mop, dust cloth, and broom become an extension of our limbs. We grow more aware of the subtle rhythm of our breathing, the subliminal lubdub of our heartbeat. Our nerves are soothed by the sound of running water. Our noses pick up the sweet scent of polish. And our fingers are entranced by the smooth consistency wax. Jung was right: We come back to our senses when we perform these basic chores.
Thank you, Valerie, for this wonderful reminder. As a big fan of the mundane, I believe that the dread of house chores is actually intrinsic to the bread of life … of creating a home no matter how big or small the family.
While I readily admit that I am super finicky in my housekeeping, I enjoy its meditative power and the glow of everything brilliantly clean. I also try to be as eco-friendly as possible in how and what I clean with, though in my opinion whoever invented the washing machine deserves heaven beyond heaven.
I feel the same way about my ultra light Dyson vacuum. Gives me more time to cook!
Your view of home and the inner life is exquisite and comes through in all your tender writing here. Thank you!
Friends use to ask me how I could find peacefulness in ironing clothes, and I would always say, that its my time to be silent and listen to the thoughts roll around in my head, and coming up with good ideas for writing. It was therapy. Housekeeping doesn’t always have to be boring as you so eloquently state Valierie. Thank you.
Yes! Thanks, Lynn. I’m an ironer, too! So glad you agree with this mindful approach to and hope you’ll follow us at Reinventinghome.org as well as on this wonderful platform Dennis has created.
The people I meet through BizCatalyst are beautifully attuned to the inner life of home. Perhaps because so many of us work from it — and others are glad to get back, at the end of a long day, to its warm embrace.
I am and always have been a homebody despite my career of being mostly away from home. However, at the end of a shift, I would just think of nothing but being home with my daughter and enjoying its comfort. I will take a look at Reinventinghome.org. Thank you
Valerie, thank you for sharing this lighthearted yet insightful article. I always find a certain sense of calm when I clean the house. While it’s a chore that I sometimes dread doing, I do enjoy sitting down afterward and relaxing amid tidy surroundings. Plus, it is an excellent way to destress and work out angst. Even if I only run the vacuum, it is sometimes the boost I need to be able to reframe my thoughts.
I Heartily agree!
I absolutely love this article, Valerie! Your beautiful prose and appreciation of Carl Yung make my essential feng shui heart very happy!
Along with the experiences you’ve described eloquently here, I also see cleaning as a form of meditation and a way to practice gratitude for all the belongings that inspire, support, and serve my life. Internally, I thank each precious treasure as I dust or wash it. I know these belongings feel sacred to me-especially because I have loved and let go of so many other items. The ones in my home right now seem extra special-they, like me, made it safely to this Bonus Round of Being Alive, the quieter days of writing in the house on the side of the mountain, and the realization that I’ve been an introvert pretending or feeling shamed into being an extravert for much too long. All I really want to do is live quietly, peacefully in the home of my soul, and be of love and service to others in the nuanced moments of full presence interaction.
Living life in a flow of housekeeping, meditating, running around a gorgeous lake, writing on this laptop, commenting on beautiful articles like this one, serving clients, connecting with beloved ones feels much simpler, fulfilling, and aligned.
Thank you so much for this wonderful article that makes my heart sing!
Thank you, Laura. I always love hearing your take on these things and I’m so pleased you enjoyed this. Ann Arnold, the illustrator and I are working on two books, The Secret Lives of Our Possessions and Slow Housekeeping, both of which feature a rich, imaginal approach to the home. Sometimes whimsical, sometimes deeply spiritual, our love affair with home really sets the stage for all other relationships from community to government. I know you are a student of Eastern wisdom. Remember this quote from Confucius?
“When the perfect order prevails, the world is like a home shared by all. Leaders are capable and virtuous. Everyone loves and respects their own parents and children as well as the parents and children of others. The old are cared for, adults have jobs, children are nourished and educated. There is a means of support for all those who are disabled or find themselves alone in the world. Everyone has an appropriate role to play in the family and society. Devotion to public duty leaves no place for idleness. Scheming for ill gain is unknown. Sharing displaces selfishness and materialism.”
How wonderful, Valerie! So it’s interesting that I dread housekeeping with every fiber in my body, yet when I give into the need, find peace and sometimes even joy in the process. I’m hoping your piece might mitigate the dread so I can get to peace and joy faster!
Thanks. It’s sort of like exercise. Getting down do it can be a challenge, but once there, it gets interesting and afterwards, a big reward:)