When I'm working with couples it often comes up that each partner is looking for more from the other. Inevitably we explore the idea of encouraging a behavior without controlling or pestering each other. While on this topic I often find myself getting flashes of how my wife, many moons ago, trained me to make the bed. Amazingly, she accomplished not only getting me to take on the task, but also getting me to do it happily.
Not to play into stereotypes, but what makes this especially impressive is that like many men I started off playing the "practical" card. Thinking it was a waste of time to do something so purely aesthetic. She started with a steep initial climb. We have been married several years at this point, but I was well into my adult life when we first started sorting out how to live together without fighting over little things. I was pretty set in my non-bed making ways. To give myself a little credit, I was aware of relationship issues enough (I wasn’t formally trained in relationships at the time) to know that it was only fair that if I was the last one to leave the bed it made sense that I take responsibility for the bed. Seeing as I was the thing keeping her from doing it herself.
During this time she was in her graduate program and I had a later wake-up, so it quickly became apparent I was going to be the designated bed maker. I wasn’t exactly ecstatic about how that played out. I would do it, but I didn't like it. This is where her magic begins.
I had mostly accepted my terrible lot in life, thinking I would just have to go along with this crazy obsession with a made bed (such a hard life), but I also couldn't help but wonder why it was important to her. When I asked I tried to do so with an open mind. Luckily it seemed to come across that way. In response she thought about it and then talked about how it feels to come home to an organized home. The content wasn't so surprising but the way she talked about it made it clear she got a lot of pleasure coming home to a made bed. Good enough, I took her at her word with only a small part of me wondering if she was just doing a good job selling it (that skeptical part can get me in trouble sometimes).
As time passed I started appreciating she wasn't just conning me. That pleasure came through every time she saw the made bed. Every time she came across that neatly straightened bed she would give out a joyous, "You made the bed!" At one point I realized even if she was conning me it was clear she still must have really cared a lot; putting so much effort into convincing me she cared. But, ultimately it seemed genuine. So genuine in fact I wouldn't have been surprised if she had said it when I wasn't around.
Each time gave my brain a little pleasure bump. The positive association started as a lightly worn dirt path in my neural pathways and then kept growing until it was a four-lane highway. It got easier and easier to motivate myself. I would just have to think of her joy and I would instinctively want to take a little time to make the bed.
There were mornings when I was running late and I was more than a little tempted to skip it all together. This is when my perfectionist part was torn. I could either lose my streak and dent her trust in my ability to reliably make the bed or do a sloppy job. Both possibilities seemed awful to my perfectionist part. I eventually decided "general reliability" is more important than "reliable perfection," so I did a quick pull and tuck. In life, I've generally decided that whenever possible do something for the relationship, no matter how small or flawed (full disclosure, I was never that good at making the bed to begin with).
This is another great characteristic of my wife's approach. On those rushed days, even with a haphazard straightening, my wife would still give out a beautiful, "You made the bed!" It would have been all too easy for her to see me as slacking off and fall prey to the slippery slope fallacy, worrying that I didn't care anymore or that I was trying to weasel out of it. Instead, she looked past the flaws, gave me the benefit of the doubt (essential in relationships) and was still grateful.
The true wonder of all this was how she was rewiring my brain without trying. What started off for me as difficult and took a decent amount of effort became easier and easier. As years passed I figured out some tricks (for example knowing how far one side should be pulled down to be even without having to check the other side), my muscles got better at the fluffing and smoothing, I got a better sense for throwing pillows into their spots, and a bunch of other tiny little tweaks cut the time in half.
Amazingly I got to the point where habit kicked in and it wasn't even much of a thought. I could knock out a solid job in a minute or two. Once I realized how quick it was it felt weird not to make the bed. To get there it took years of my wife's ephemeral yet consistent attention and gratitude. The consequence is I now officially make the bed for myself, just because I like a made bed. And she knows this, and yet she still gives me that little boost of happiness and always says, "You made the bed!"