It’s kind of embarrassing when you start to realize just how much stuff one family can have when there’s so much lack and suffering in the lives of others. I’m pretty sure now that this exercise in downsizing was as much for me to learn something about myself as it was to diminish our possessions and have a greater appreciation of what is really necessary to be happy in this life.

Don’t get me wrong, I understood all this in my head. I’ve always considered my family to be generous with our resources, but it’s different when you begin to really get it on what I call a soul level. It’s like the light going on and understanding that you don’t need all the stuff you have just because you can have it – and also understanding that somewhere along the way all that stuff we have becomes a burden of maintenance, storage, etc.

Needless to say, I’m not out of the clearing stages just yet. With each new day, I get a little more clarity and I shed a little more of the stuff I thought I really needed to move with me this time. Sometimes it’s painful to acknowledge that a hobby I had for years just doesn’t interest me anymore. I gaze at the hundreds (maybe thousands) of dollars of stuff I have to enjoy that hobby, and something in me begins to wheedle and bargain to make a case for keeping it. It tells me that I have so much money and time invested. What if I need it again? The tape rolls over and over in my brain until one of us wins.

I’m happy to say that six months into our temporary home, we are really beginning to own what makes us happy and rid ourselves of what doesn’t. We’ve found that it is seldom our stuff that brings us joy – unless it’s our memorabilia like photos, old baseball jerseys, and yearbooks. But even so, I’m seeing that those things are of no use to us unless we can enjoy them, which doesn’t happen buried in a box and lost in the hidden spaces of our home.

I’m condensing the boys’ things down to the things I really think will matter. Ticket stubs to every game they ever played have made it to the recycling bin along with a heap of other questionable treasures. What remains are the things that I know hold special memories for them, and the rest are those that hold special memories for me in relation to them (along with a little note telling them why I kept it). I figure when I’m dead and gone, they will find it, look through it fondly, trash what is meaningless, and save their own treasures.

I am finding a great lifting of my spirits as we lighten the load of stuff around our home. I find I laugh more and enjoy life more. Perhaps clearing our physical stuff is just a metaphor for something greater. Whatever it is, I’ll continue sorting and letting go. I like the end result, and I know my kids will appreciate that I’ve already done most of the dirty work one day when we kick the bucket and it becomes their job to clean out what remains!