Dirty Dishes Don’t Need Passion

I can’t stand dirty dishes in the sink. There’s something so repulsive about a wet, soggy concoction of miscellaneous food bits and mismatches leftovers that grosses me out. It even affects my ability to rinse completely mutually exclusive silverware, cups, and dishes with this dirty wreckage below. I can’t do it.

As a result, and as you probably guessed, I won’t leave dishes in the sink. What’s quite peculiar, though, is that I’m not a neat freak. I don’t care to have extreme order or cleanliness in virtually any place of my life. So, why do I do the dishes with such remarkable compliance? Is it because I have a divine passion for dish doing? Do I find purpose in this soapy pastime? No, of course, I don’t. I simply dislike the experience of dirty dishes in the sink more than I dislike doing the dishes.

I’m sure you can imagine I haven’t brought you here to discuss chores around the house, and you’re right. This observation is important for reasons outside of the kitchen. If, for example, in your mind you’re making discipline out to be an issue of passionate preferences, you’re making a potentially grave error. That’s silly. After all, there are plenty of things we do diligently and regularly that we don’t love, and rightfully so.

Similarly, despite what some might assume, I don’t particularly like training. It doesn’t bring me joy. It wouldn’t make a ‘Top 5’ list of my favorite activities. Nonetheless, I dislike the idea of who I’d be as an untrained individual more than I dislike training.

This approach gets results, maintains accountability, and is, flat out, more truthful than the idea that fit people are just the one’s like love a good sweat. You don’t have to be a neat freak to do the dishes in the same way you don’t need to be a gym rat to be a highly capable physical being.

 

Logan Gelbrich

@functionalcoach