I am no stranger to letting go. I have let go of countries, of people, of things, or at least I think I have. When it comes down to it, I am still mentally holding on to those countries and those people. I am holding on to things. For things, I have sacrificed my time, energy and focus. I am swimming in the debt of living in one of the most expensive cities in the United States, and the consumerist need to “root” after spending so long living abroad and moving from place to place. I go through phases where I collect and store twigs for my nest and then I get fed up with it all and decide to purge and go through a mad spell of getting rid of all of those things and getting back to a simpler way of living. I like to start from scratch.

When my mom died, the family went through this insane phase of arguing over and hoarding her things. But those things will not bring her back, and they don’t make us any safer from a similar fate. I love color and design and I let the media sell me the idea of freedom and happiness through colorful baubles. I know I am smarter than that, but I experience that relentless pull to consume, consume, consume, searching for happiness while leaving no store unturned. The stress of never having it all, of “needing” just this one more thing is overwhelming. I go on internet journeys, hopping from site to site, mentally collecting the clutter and feeling more and more anxious about the imagined dwindling of my bank account. I am exhausted by it and I am sure it is not the answer. I have mentioned that some of my happiest times were abroad with just a suitcase of items to lend a hand to the journey.

I am ready to try again to pare down my environment to just those things that add value to my life. I watched the documentary The Minimalists on Netflix and it hit such a chord within me that I started getting rid of things rapidly. I watched it several times, had a yard sale, talked with my neighbors about it (they felt the same way about it hitting some deeper chord) and kept eyeing things in my place that I could unload. It felt amazingly freeing, though I am still working on it. I regress into consumption, I refuse to let go, I deal with the stress and anxiety of managing my things. But I am still trying, and I am more convinced than ever that it is a life changing process and will allow me to find peace.

I am also trying to instill these ideas in Dante. I routinely ask him to go through his toys and decide what he uses and wants and what he can get rid of to make space for other things. I let him keep the money from anything of his that is sold at our yard sales. We are working on this idea of rediscovering what is important, because I swear we knew it once. With so many things around, we can never really appreciate them all, it just takes too much mental space to sort and love through the clutter, and I could sure use that mental space. It’s time to revisit this goal, and go through my garage, my baskets of clothes and shelves of books. Letting go is a choice and it makes space for so much more to happen and so many adventures to come whooshing in.