Is there “junk” in your life? What kind? How
do you get rid of it?
I have spent
the last 8 years or so cleaning out the “junk” in my life, so to speak. Those are the years after my divorce, the
years of moving from a 3 bedroom home with my boys to a Bachelor’s Quarters
(BQ) by myself to a 2 bedroom home with my boys again and eventually with my
husband now, and they are the years of leaving the island I called home for
close to two decades to move back to the “real world” of the U.S., so I’ve
accomplished lots of house cleaning chores, both materially and mentally,
during those times.
How did I
get rid of the junk? Well, at first, I
had to do it quickly, inventory and take only what really mattered to me, weigh
out what I physically needed and what I emotionally needed to take with me to
that BQ. Just that one act of getting
myself out of an emotionally detrimental situation started the cathartic
process of letting go of the junk. This also kicked off my journey to discover
what I really needed to find peace and gain contentment in my life. A lot of the emotional junk fell away when I
removed myself from the relationships that were keeping me in constant pain and
depression, but there was still that lingering bitterness, the worst kind of
junk. To get rid of that, I prayed and prayed and prayed and prayed some more.
And I cried, a lot. But, in the end, God
washed it all away from me. He gave me a
new perspective on life; he showed me how to let go and stop living in fear and
anger. He helped me hand my control
issues over to Him, and the rest of the junk just fell away.
The only
thing left after cleaning out the emotional junk was the material junk in my
life and with each move from house to house and place to place, I’ve gotten rid
of that by giving myself one last opportunity to relive the memories and then
send it off where it needs to go (whether that is to goodwill to help someone
else in need, to the garbage, or to be boxed up, saved, and stored for my boys
later on). I don’t have the time or
energy in my life anymore for junk. I
would rather enjoy my life than have it become cluttered with the unnecessary and
hurtful stuff that tends to accumulate if you don’t pay attention to it. I’m certainly not saying I never turn away or
overlook the accumulating junk, but I try to regularly evaluate my life and
determine what needs to go and what needs to stay, for now. And I follow my original housecleaning plan:
distance myself from or let go of the harmful relationships in my life and
pray, pray, and pray some more about the rest. I think I get better and better
at it each year my life progresses, so maybe when I depart this world, I won’t
leave behind too much junk for my kids to have to clean out. J
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