It's getting easier
Jun. 16th, 2010 10:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flexagonOn both Monday and Tuesday I went to work by way of the Goodwill. On Monday I left that poster I've had since 1993, which I took out of its frame over the weekend and took a good high-resolution photo of. I felt a giant twinge as I walked away from it, but my home still feels like my home -- of course it does, that poster had been hidden behind the couch.
(Also dearly departed are two mugs, made for me by two friends who then had a nasty breakup. Perfectly awesome mugs, and they embodied sweet thoughts, except that I was thinking fleetingly of that breakup every time I opened the kitchen cabinet. Who needs that? I still have a pair of earrings handmade for me by the one friend I'm still friends with.)
The most interesting part of this whole minimizing process is observing how twinges fade. Every week or so I find I can handle another twinge, and when the twinges fade I feel lighter and stronger. It's really true, people are not their stuff. I am not my stuff. I've read enough fantasy books over the years to say this: it feels as if the energy I had invested in various objects is coming back into me as I let them go. And on a more prosaic note, I really like the physical process of carrying things for 10 or 12 minutes and then setting them down. I could always change my mind at that point, as I stand there with my spine decompressing, but it turns out there are few things so dear to me that I still want to carry them BACK from there. :)
I also find that going over the same category of stuff over multiple weeks can be useful. Clothes and books that make the cut once may not stand up to scrutiny a third or fourth time.
Lastly, a giant source of pressure has been lifted off me at work, not for any reason having to do with me. I've spent the last two days feeling giddily relieved, and today I was both productive and having fun. Ah, the smooth relaxing hum of a deadline slipping! I can't even bring myself to be guilty about enjoying it so much. This doesn't solve all my problems forever, but it gives me more time to think, and I sure won't have to work this weekend.
(Also dearly departed are two mugs, made for me by two friends who then had a nasty breakup. Perfectly awesome mugs, and they embodied sweet thoughts, except that I was thinking fleetingly of that breakup every time I opened the kitchen cabinet. Who needs that? I still have a pair of earrings handmade for me by the one friend I'm still friends with.)
The most interesting part of this whole minimizing process is observing how twinges fade. Every week or so I find I can handle another twinge, and when the twinges fade I feel lighter and stronger. It's really true, people are not their stuff. I am not my stuff. I've read enough fantasy books over the years to say this: it feels as if the energy I had invested in various objects is coming back into me as I let them go. And on a more prosaic note, I really like the physical process of carrying things for 10 or 12 minutes and then setting them down. I could always change my mind at that point, as I stand there with my spine decompressing, but it turns out there are few things so dear to me that I still want to carry them BACK from there. :)
I also find that going over the same category of stuff over multiple weeks can be useful. Clothes and books that make the cut once may not stand up to scrutiny a third or fourth time.
Lastly, a giant source of pressure has been lifted off me at work, not for any reason having to do with me. I've spent the last two days feeling giddily relieved, and today I was both productive and having fun. Ah, the smooth relaxing hum of a deadline slipping! I can't even bring myself to be guilty about enjoying it so much. This doesn't solve all my problems forever, but it gives me more time to think, and I sure won't have to work this weekend.
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no subject
Date: 2010-06-17 02:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 02:29 am (UTC)