Thank You

I dislike cleaning the bathrooms.  The gleaming, sparkling results are wonderful but the effect is short-lived as the family waltzes right in to use the newly cleaned facilities.  I mean, the nerve of some people.  Give me at least an hour of dreaming they will look forever like a magazine-perfect bathrooms.  Where does all that gunk come from in just one week's time?

Cleaning the bathrooms may not have a long lasting effect, but my family's gratitude does.  Thank you.  The bathroom looks great.  Those two little words, "thank you," make all the difference in my attitude.  The family knows I'm doing something for their benefit and they don't take me for granted.

I have to be honest, though.  Those words didn't always flow out of their mouths after I scrubbed their toilets and cleaned their hairs out of the bathtub.  At first, their lack of expressed appreciation bummed me out and then downright annoyed me.   I knew I needed an attitude adjustment about ministering to my family, but I also knew that this was a teaching moment for them.

So I shared that my faithfully cleaning their bathrooms every week without so much as a peep of acknowledgment from them made me feel like ~ well, it made me feel like their maid.  The feeling was as yucky as the bathrooms I was cleaning.  So I expressed that a simple "thank you" goes a long way, a long, long way.  It's not merely a social grace or nice manners, it's an expression of love and appreciation for what others do for us.

I was so glad I checked my heart attitude before speaking out because my words were "teachable" words not "accusatory" ones.  The family got it.  Our "thank you" now flows generously amongst us for not just bathroom cleaning but for all the mundane tasks that befall a community sharing living space.