Okay, let's face it, no one really likes to clean toilets, but someone's gotta do it. It's pretty safe to say this has been one area of life that I have had a hard time accepting, and this goes back to as long as I can remember. As a kid, I remember having to clean the bathroom once a week as a part of my chores, and I always hated it. Then, after I left home, the realization became even more prominent, because I found out the bathroom will get pretty gross if it's not cleaned regularly. For many young adults, living on their own, it can be an area that gets neglected. Usually, at some point, we buckle down, grit our teeth, and get it over with, but is that the way it has to be?
When we have this sort of resistance to something, it is called aversion. In Buddhism, there are 3 things that cause us to suffer, craving, aversion, and ignorance. In this sense, facing our aversions head-on, quite literally when it comes to cleaning toilets, seems like a good usage of our time. I know I want to bring and end to suffering in my life, and so it becomes a matter of figuring out what needs to be done, and then doing it. I know that meditation is the most important practice that leads to freedom and liberation, but this practice of purification extends far beyond the formal practice of sitting silently in the cross-legged position.
Up until recently, on the 10-day retreat I did with Christopher Titmuss in Bodhgaya last month, I always got away without cleaning toilets while on retreat. Even when I spent a month as a monk, I remember only having to clean the toilet once. I was always assigned different jobs and then never was quick to volunteer when the need arose. I kept quiet, waiting for someone else to rise to the task, knowing that it was something I really didn't want to do. Now, as my practice continues to develop and I am getting stronger, I am always looking for ways to get rid of more and more of the junk that I no longer need. Aversion to cleaning toilets can be seen as junk that I don't need. It isn't serving me. In fact, it is causing me to suffer. I think that cleanging toilets will cause me to suffer, but I'm actually suffering from having this aversion, and having dirty bathrooms.
So on that retreat, on the first day, the retreat manager mentioned that there would be a list of tasks for the yogis (meditators) that needed to be done for the retreat to run smoothly. She said that between all of the yogis, all the jobs needed to get done, but she didn't mention how many jobs each person should sign up for. As soon as I heard the list of jobs, which of course, included cleaning the bathrooms, I thought to myself, "Definitely gonna sign up for anything but that!" Then, something happened. Having realized that this thought arose, and then the place of aversion that it came from, I had a change of heart. When I got to the board, that contained the sign-up sheets for all the different jobs, I figured I should at least clean the bathroom once, as that only seemed fair.
But after writing my name once, and thinking about how there was 10-days and three different bathroom blocks to clean, it still seemed like I was trying to fly under the radar. Cleaning toilets one day out of 10 wasn't going to be a way of facing my aversion, it would just strengthen it. It would just be a way of getting it over with, and doing the least amount as possible. That would be like getting over a fear of heights by going to a high place only once. It needs repeatedly be addressed, even if it's a little bit at a time, otherwise, you'll freak yourself out and never want to return to that place of fear, or aversion, within you.
Having realized this, I signed up to clean the toilets on 7 out of 10 days, easily more than anyone else on the retreat. "There, that should do it," I said to myself (the retreat was silent). But that still doesn't address the problem. The problem is that there is a belief that if I can avoid this task, I will be happy, or in other words, that this task will make me unhappy. Even if I did it everyday, or twice a day, I still might end up reinforcing this problematic belief. The only solution, then, is to learn to love it, or at least, to not hate it. One way we can deal with aversion is by recognizing that it is at work. How does aversion manifest? Usually in terms of judgment, or thoughts like, "this is so horrible, I wish I didn't have to be doing this!" If these judgments and thoughts go on unnoticed, they become powerful. They are created by the ego as a way to solidify itself. "I shouldn't have to be doing this," the ego says. But as soon as we start paying attention to these little tricks that the ego plays, it starts to lose its power over us.
"Why shouldn't I have to do this?" you can ask yourself. "Do I not use these toilets, am I not partially responsible for them?" "Would it not make me happy to have a clean facility to use?" Like this, we can start to bring reason into the picture, to balance out the ridiculousness and childishness of the ego. But the ego is looking for a fight, it is a constant provoker, so if we resort to its level, we will be left with a mental battlefield. The key to defeating the ego is not through power or force, but through observation and acceptance. Acceptance, here, comes in the form of admitting that I have a problem. "I accept that I have a problem when it comes to cleaning toilets." The ego doesn't like this, when you practice acceptance like this.
The other step, observation, comes initially, to witness the aversion arising, and then throughout the process of cleaning the toilets, in which the aversion will continue to arise. If we recognize the aversion before we start cleaning, and then go unconscious while cleaning, we will be lost in our judging mind. This is when we need to practice mindfulness of mind. We need to watch the mind like a hawk, knowing that it is mischievous. If you have an opiate junkie in the house, do you leave your pain killers unsupervised? No, you keep them locked down, heavily guarded, constantly supervised. In the same way, we need to watching the mind when we face our aversions, knowing that the ego will manifest and use our voice as its own, posing as us. When we see these judgments, we can say, "I see you, judging mind," and we can be sure that the judgments are representations of aversion, not of who or what we really are. Who or what I really am has nothing to do with cleaning toilets, but as it turns out, my freedom does. So if I want to be free, I need to purify my mind from these aversions.
The other technique here is to practice mindfulness of the actual act of cleaning. This is a way of keeping the mind focused on what it is doing, limiting the opportunity for the judging mind to take the center stage. If we aren't being mindful of what we are doing, we are probably lost in thoughts, and oftentimes, those thoughts are negative and harmful. But we need to be careful, just because we are being mindful of the present moment, doesn't mean that that the judging mind isn't still there, chiming in in the background. That is why we always need to be keeping an eye out for these judgments while facing our aversions, because even though they aren't always prominent aspects of our experience, but they are still there, and we are still believing them.
By calling them out, we can choose to ignore them. We don't have to take them seriously. We can see them for what they are, and where they come from, and even though we might still agree with them on some level, we can see that they are only perpetuating our suffering by reinforcing our aversion.
On retreat, then, my practice became something like this. "Scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing, judgment arising, scrubbing, scrubbing, scrubbing, frustration arising." It's very simple, but it works. Over the days, I noticed that the judgments were becoming weaker, and my mindfulness of the scrubbing was becoming stronger. I dare say that at times, there were even moments when I found myself enjoying the process, seeing the service I was doing for myself and others, and the simple but gratifying task of moving my hand in circles to make something shiny and clean. When you take away all the mental baggage that surrounds aversion, you might find the bare sensations associated with the task aren't that bad. The mental proliferations are always worse that than the reality of the situation. When we don't notice the mental proliferations, they grow bigger and stronger and eventually, they take over. So what we need to do is keep watching and keep calling them out, and eventually, our minds will be come steady and we can focus on the task at hand, without making it any worse that it really is.
I might add that although I found some peaceful moments there, in doing my duty, I'm not out there looking for extra toilets to clean. On the next retreat I did, there was a similar sign-up system, but at that center, they came right out and indicated how often a yogi should be cleaning the bathrooms, once a week. I stayed for 8 days, and I signed up to clean once. The two things I wanted to avoid was flying way under the radar, and not addressing the responsibility, and having the attitude of just trying to get it over with. So I cleaned it once, and cleaned it well. I tried my best to stay present, and to keep an eye on my mind, waiting for judgments to arise. And they did, but this time, I had a much better attitude about the whole thing, and tried to connect with that sense of pride of taking care of my responsibilities. There is still plenty more work to do, but if I keep working like this, I can continue gaining more and more freedom from negative thought patterns and compulsive resistance to situations I don't like. Knowing that aversion is one of the main causes of suffering, I can rest assured it won't be a waste of my time.
So the next time you have to do something you really don't want to do, I invite you to try this practice. 1. Notice the aversion arise, and label it. 2. While performing the duty, try to stay mindful of the actual sensations of the actions. 3. Keep a watchful eye on the mental reactions, judgments, the internal complaints that make it worse than it has to be. 4. Enjoy the good feeling that you are facing your aversion and are on the path to purification, liberation, and lasting happiness.
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