Scrubbing the floor regularly
Someone suggested I learn about a writer named Pico Iyer. In an interview I listened to he talked about the musician Leonard Cohen, who apparently spent time living as a monk. Cohen’s practice, according to Iyer, included scrubbing the floor.
The practice doesn’t sound glamorous. You can hire someone to do it. Why bother if you can afford not to?
![](https://i0.wp.com/joshuaspodek.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/scrubbing_floor.jpg?resize=700%2C467&ssl=1)
The movie Amazing Grace, about William Wilberforce, showed John Newton living monk-like and scrubbing floors.
My podcast guest Cassiano Laureano, world record holder for most burpees in an hour, told me about scrubbing his gym’s floors for hours at a time.
Over the past five years or so, I’ve adopted a practice of scrubbing my floors each day I lift weights at home. This frequency meant once every five days for years until last summer. Around my fiftieth birthday, I changed my cycle to a six-day frequency. So every sixth day I get on my hands and knees and scrub the floor.
I wouldn’t call the practice meditation, but I would call it meditative. It creates discipline and therefore self-awareness and personal growth. It costs nothing and give me time to think, plus cleans the floor.
To clarify, I usually mostly sponge the floor, though occasionally scrub. Since I started doing it regularly, I think between five and ten years ago, I don’t think I missed a day I was home.
I recommend the practice, along with making your bed daily.
Read my weekly newsletter
![](https://i0.wp.com/convertkit.s3.amazonaws.com/subscription_forms/images/005/129/483/standard/Initiative_Leadership_Spodek.jpg?ssl=1)
On initiative, leadership, the environment, and burpees