I went to go run a few errands this afternoon and walked through the garage and out to my car. “What a mess,” I thought.
Garages are generally used as storage for all kinds of stuff. Cars, tools, Christmas decorations, bikes, old work boots, camping gear, shovels, rakes. The list could probably go on for a while. For goodness sakes, it’d probably take me years to list all of the different things people keep tucked away in their garages. And there’s probably quite a few weird things that people keep in there too, that don’t make any sense, but the garage is just where it’s kind of ended up. And, well, it’s there now, so why move it, right?
Everybody has a garage. I mean, not necessarily like a big, spacious, two-car attached garage. But a metaphorical garage.
Everybody has junk stored away somewhere deep inside. Chances are, it’s a messy garage. Sure they’ve got the “normal” stuff like everyone else. (Whatever that really even means.) But we’ve all got weird things that we’ve shoved in our figurative garages for different reasons and just don’t feel like taking the energy to pick it up and move it to where it belongs.
And heaven forbid if anyone ever sees your incredibly messy garage, because you’re just absolutely positive that theirs is pristine and spotless.
Listen to me, almost everyone has a disastrously messy garage. Stop comparing yourself to others and thinking that you are alone! Stop letting the lies of this world defeat you and tell you that you are the only one with emotional/physical/or spiritual baggage tucked away in your garage. YOU. ARE. NOT.
Yes, some people do have clean garages with nice workbenches built in and all that jazz. Let me tell you something else: these people did not get a clean garage by leaving their junk sit there. It took work. Probably a lot of it. It probably took help from friends or family. It might have taken a little elbow grease and several buckets of soapy water. Garages do not get clean by piling up your junk and never letting anyone see it.
Clean garages also do not stay that way. They might get really really really messy again. The cleaning process might have to start all over. Or they might just get a little bit messy and need to be tidied up on a daily basis. Either way, a clean garage does not stay clean without work.
People, stop being ashamed of your “messy garage,” go get yourself a bucket of water and a friend, and get to cleaning. Put all that crap where it belongs. Maybe some stuff just needs to get pitched. Get it out of your life. For good. You might need to just straighten up some of the baggage in your life, and put it neatly on a shelf because that’s where it belongs. That’s okay! Sometimes we have stuff in our life that we can’t really get rid of but it doesn’t need to be strewn about, constantly getting in the way of doing life. Pack it up and put it away. Yes, it’s still there. Yes, it’s still junk. But if you put in the work to clean it up now, you don’t have to trip over it every. single. day.
Cleaning up your garage is probably going to be a lot of hard work, but it’s worth it. And once you’ve gotten your own garage straightened up a little, why not go lend a helping hand to someone else who is struggling to get theirs cleaned?
