I spent much of the morning of Labor Day up in the attic of my garage. I have decided to scale back and simplify, and let go of many of the possessions I’ve collected over the fifty-plus years of my life.
I am ashamed to admit I’ve never been up in that attic. I would always send one of my sons to either store or retrieve an item from that distant and rather eerie region. They had to climb to the very top of our tallest ladder, climb into the opening in the ceiling of our garage, and disappear into the dimly-lit cavern on what seemed to be less-than-sturdy boards placed across the rafters.
Now, both sons are living away from home. The attic needed to be emptied, so it was up to me.
I got to the top of the ladder and gingerly climbed onto the attic boards, testing them to be sure they could hold my weight. I started moving boxes toward the opening and lowering them down. As I would remove one stack of boxes, I would discover another behind it, and another, and another! Surely I could not have kept this many things for so long! Yet, the evidence was there before me, covering me with dust as I moved each box out of the deepest recesses and onto the ladder.
How much of it was useful to me, and needed?
Very little. As a matter of fact, I’d forgotten much of it, although most of it has been weighing on my subconscious mind. For years, each time I looked into the garage, my eyes would glance up at that opening and I would think, “I wonder what all is up there? really need to clear that out.” But there was never time, and I would push the thought to the back of my mind, just as I’d been pushing all those items to the back of the attic all those years.
Today, it was time. Box after box came down, and as the pile on the garage floor grew, I felt ashamed that I had let things get to this point. But as the garage was filling up, the attic was clearing out, and as I pulled the last box out, it felt SO wonderful to look at that vast space, now cleared and freed from all those piles.
Now my task is to sort it all, and my goal is to have very little in the “to keep” pile. If it’s been in the attic, unused for that long, I can obviously live without it. I don’t need it, and it is just cluttering up my life. I am going to let go.
Do you find that there are things in your life that you’ve been holding onto? As we work through bereavement, it is easy to hold onto thoughts, habits, pain, and fears just because we don’t want to face them and do the work of moving them out. But if we’ll take on that task, great healing and peace will be ours.
Let today be the day! Find out what you’ve been carrying that you don’t want or need anymore –
and Let Go!
Find hope after loss 