When are chores not really chores? When a spoonful of mindfulness is added, of course! While it’s not exactly front page news, a recent study out of Florida State University found that students who washed dishes mindfully — by focusing on sensations — experienced a reduction in nervousness and an increase in “mental inspiration”.

The researchers may themselves have been inspired  by Jon Kabat-Zinn, whose best selling “Wherever You Go, There You Are” included an essay on “Cleaning the Stove While Listening to Bobby McFerrin”. Kabat-Zinn wrote, “I can lose myself and find myself simultaneously while cleaning the kitchen stove…I get into the round and round or the back and forth, feeling the motion in my whole body.”

In fact, it is attending to the sensory experience that uplifts both washing dishes and cleaning the stove. We start to notice the smell of the soap, the soothing warmth of the water, the hard or soft surfaces being cleaned, and the sounds of scrubbing, scraping, and water running. If a jumble of sensations has been metaphorically going in one ear and out the other, mindfully cleaning offers the opportunity to stop and focus on each one separately.

Educator Maria Montessori once said that, “We cannot create observers by saying ‘observe’, but by giving them the power and the means for this observation and these means are procured through education of the senses.”

Just as the Montessori method of learning emphasizes exploring and manipulating things in the environment, our practice of mindfulness can also be enhanced by educating our senses, and manipulating them to discern the separate inputs. Our everyday lives provide many moments when we can practice this, but we can also benefit from designated exercises from time to time. Here is one from the book, “Sense Relaxation Below Your Mind””:

Hand Washing with Salt:

Close your eyes and wash your hands.

Take some ordinary table salt and rub it gently over the back and front of the hands. Do each of the fingers. Rinse, and feel the skin. After drying your hands, rub in some oil or cream.

Experience how your hands feel.

For those of us who sometimes think that our sense of touch has been reduced to tap, swipe and pinch; our sense of hearing to beeps and buzzes; and our sense of sight to the glow of a retina display, practicing sensory awareness can restore and renew us. Become the observer, rather than the thinker, for a while. The means to do it are there if you choose to use them. So if a few weekend chores are hanging over your head today, consider them an opportunity to lose yourself  — and then find yourself anew.