“Should I make my bed every morning?” the email began.
The writer of the letter is a 24-year-old who I’ll call Jerry. Jerry is in graduate school. His major is in medicine. He is—without getting too technical—a grown freaking man.
“My dad is a Army colonel,” Jerry went on, “who used to spank me if I didn’t make the bed each morning. …He believes making the bed is setting oneself up for success.
“But now that I’m on my own, I don’t make my bed, and I know Dad is disappointed in me. It even makes him mad at me. What do you think, Sean?”
Well, Jerry. The way I see it, there are two camps.
There is the camp that believes making the bed improves your mental health and propels you toward wealth and success. And there is the camp that believes in eating Cocoa Puffs out of a dirty bowl found in the sink that has not been washed since the Clinton administration.
I belong to the latter camp.
That isn’t to say I don’t believe in making the bed. It’s just that I conscientiously choose to abstain.
Namely, because there are more important things in my morning routine than the condition of my sheets. Such as, strong coffee, properly cooked eggs, Gary Larson, and the importance of relief pitching in a National League lineup.
The problem is, this world rewards Type-A behavior. We learn about these rewards young. Authority figures are constantly telling us:
“Wake up early!” “study hard!” “brush your teeth” “go to college,” “get a good job,” “eat right,” “exercise,” “invest in an IRA,” “don’t eat cholesterol,” “buy a nice car,” “be a success,” “get your kids into the right school,” “and don’t forget to brush your teeth!”
But did you know that you can go one week without brushing your teeth before your enamel starts to fail? That’s right. You have seven days.
So don’t misunderstand, I’m not saying you should quit cleaning your teeth. Your armpits, yes. But not your teeth.
What I’m saying is, where are the healthy voices in our society encouraging people to chill out?
Where are the voices saying: “Sleep in,” “take today off,” “do something fun,” “get a job you like, not one that pays well,” “skip class and go for a hike,” “eat that extra piece of pizza,” “go ahead, you can sing karaoke.”
No, these things might not lead toward a traditional kind of success. But what is success, anyway? Having nice stuff? Having people respect you? Having a great job?
What about the success of living stress free? Isn’t that success too?
What about the success of not being at risk for a cardiac infarction? What about the success being free enough not to be controlled by other people’s expectations?
I’m not qualified to give you any advice, Jerry. And I’m certainly not suggesting making your bed is going to give you a hear attack. A stroke, maybe. But not a heart attack.
What I AM saying is that too many American workaholics spend their first 50 years ruining their health, only to spend their final 30 trying to insure it.
Sean, I hear what you are saying, yet it is the intense focus on making one's bed that possibly is your gripe with it. Maybe making a bed for 5-6 days daily and taking a day or two off now and then would be a good balance. The point you are making is well taken and seems to have more to do with balancing the minutia of life that really does have a lot of good to it, yet which should not be done solely for reasons of getting ahead. I heard a speaker one time tell of a woman who was so depressed who told her Christian counselor she found it extremely hard to get out of bed each morning. The counselor's directive was to each morning get out of bed and make her bed and then to do the next thing. In her case simply getting out of bed and making it held an important purpose for the woman. Each weekly counseling session added another simple daily task to the routine until the woman made a habit of a healthy routine and found she was not as depressed as before. The book "Make Your Bed" by William McRaven also attests to the benefit of beginning the day with making one's bed. It is a simple discipline which begins the day with placing things in order. Now being somewhat of a balanced left brain and right brain person, it is apparent to me that living a life of excessive daily discipline can quench creativity. That fails to bring about a good balance. In the end, for me, making one's bed is part of a lovely, beneficial and simple routine which if practiced but not taken to the nth degree brings a certain amount of order and peace to life. Living in this way, when on vacation or on weekends, don't make your bed, and it will feel like special luxury. This balance appreciates the good in the practice while allowing occasional breaks in the discipline. Final note, about 50 years ago I noticed when spending overnights with girlfriends that they made their beds in the morning. The practice was new to me because my mother did not require it of me and my siblings. By the time I was a junior in high school my conscience took note and compelled me to ask my mother about it. She said she never required it because she was at home during the day and we kids were at school all day doing our work. Therefore, she took on with love as part of her routine making the round of straightening our beds. The fact that my mother valued it enough to make sure it got done drew me to get in the habit of making my bed daily. I am now 65 and have been making my bed neatly enough daily with rare exceptions, and it just feels good to begin each day by putting a little something in order. Trust me, there are enough other things I let go. Anyway, simply pulling together one's bed can feel like a simple luxury. In the morning when made, the bed brings a neatness to the otherwise relaxed look of the room. At night it is a pleasure to pull back the blanket and sheet and get into bed. Thinking of making one's bed each morning as preparation to enjoy getting into a made bed at night encourages anticipating pleasure from the habit. Think about it.
Funny thing about me, I guess, is that I make my bed almost every morning. My thinking is that I try to accomplish something every day and if it is just one thing, I am good. Being retired I can accomplish as much as I want or as little as I want. I have a garden that will keep me busy, a big yard and yard equipment that also gives me something to do. But on some days, I throw caution to the wind and go to a movie. Why? Because I can.