My hair, my room, my car, my head, my heart. It’s all a mess. It all needs a good, deep clean. But being that I majored in procrastination, messiness is something I’ve just accepted. And if I’m honest, a lot of people don’t get it. They don’t understand why I’d leave something a mess when I could so easily clean it up. Maybe I have trouble letting go of things, and deep cleaning usually involves letting go. Take my room for instance. I could clean out under my bed and in my closet and drawers, but when I do, I know I’ll find those jeans I wore almost every day for a year that people made fun of me for but that I loved on me. Because I felt truly myself, and I don’t want to throw that out. I know I’ll find those dozens of books I bought and never read because I got busy or I lost interest, but I don’t want to get rid of them because that would be saying that I can’t finish anything.
This is all the same with thoughts. We all hoard thoughts like magazines we’ll never read but also never throw away or the stuffed animals we keep under our bed, not on display but at least we know they’re there and they’re not forgotten.
If we don’t go through our thoughts, they collect dust. They pile up until there’s no more room. But I justify it. Yes this memory is painful, but it’s mine, it happened to me and is a contributor to the person I am, how can I throw it in a trash bag?
Sometimes brains need a spring cleaning just as much as closets do. To prioritize your life, your thoughts, and feelings. Perhaps we’re holding onto something we never let go of because we were afraid of what could happen if we let go, and what we could potentially replace it with. But years go by and the idea that we’ll need it or use it gets further away and less likely.
I’ve learned to make room. To make room for joy and for the present. I put the past in a journal and leave it there. Because it’s taking up space, holding onto old feelings because I’m scared of what’ll happen when I let them go, it’s taking up too much room. If I clear it out maybe I’ll have space for a piano or a nice pottery wheel.
You’ll never know what you could learn if you don’t get all the stuff out of the way and make room for the new.
