Stuff, the Magic Dragon...Part II...

I'm hastily skimming a book, "Making Peace with the Things in your Life," (by Cindy Glovinsky) before returning it to the library. In some ways, this book is "not my cup of tea". However, I do think the author asks some interesting questions to help us think about our relationship to "stuff".

Our answers to these questions aren't necessarily "right" or "wrong"; they do, however, reveal our emotional feelings about things. We may not realize how those feelings affect our decisions about how we attain, use, or dispose of things. Once we understand the feelings we project onto objects, we can make more informed decisions about things.

Here are some of the questions:

1) Make a list of ten Things that you own and consider how you decided that you needed each of them. What role did friends, relatives, or advertisers play? Were you imitating someone when you brought it? What did you hope it would do for you? Did you see it as helping you to create a new identity? as empowering you in some way? as enabling you to belong? as making you or your life perfect? How did owning the object affect you once you made the purchase? Pay special attention to fashionable Things that have only recently come on the market.

2) Do you fear that if you put papers in closed containers, you'll forget where they are? Do you spread your papers on horizontal surfaces such as desktops? Do you believe this is the only way that you will be able to find them? How much time do you spend looking for lost papers?

3) Do you usually put Things away as soon as you've used them? In what situations do you do this, and what situations do you not?

4) Do you have certain times, either daily, weekly, monthly, or annually, when you routinely clean, and/or put Things away?

5) What proportion of your Things have homes? Do you know where all of these homes are? Do you use any tools, such as labels, indexes, or color coding to remind yourself where each object goes?

6) When you lose something, how do you react? Are you able to search calmly and do what you can to replace it, or do you have problems dealing with frustration? Are you constantly trying to get someone else to rescue you by finding things you have lost?

7) Once you've accepted a gift, do you feel obligated to keep it forever? What would happen if you gave it away yourself? How would you deal with this?

8) Are you keeping a lot of family heirlooms to pass on to your descendants? How do you and your potential heirs feel about these Things?

9) Would you feel guilty if you got rid of something left to you by a deceased person? How could you manage your guilt feelings? What are you afraid might happen if you give the gift(s) away?

10) Once you've decided to give or throw away a Thing, do you keep it moving to its final destination? Or, does it sit for months in your closet, back porch, front porch, lawn, or in your basement, garage, attic, car, or truck?

11) Choose a room in your home. List every Thing you can see that is not essential for your survival. On a scale from 1 to 10, how much pleasure does each of these Things currently give you? The items with a score of at least 6 are among your "Happiness Things". Now focus on the Things that received a score of less than six. Consider why you are keeping those things.

12) What do your "Happiness Things" have in common? What does that tell you about yourself?

13) Do you ever take your anger at people out on Things? Have you ever destroyed something valuable in a fit of anger?

14) In dealing with Things, are you afraid of not being perfect, of making a mistake, of forgetting something, of having to face reality, of being bored, of ruining a relationship, of feeling helpless, of having your weakness exposed, of going with out, of feeling empty? How can you deal with these feelings?

15) Walk through your home and ask yourself what you feel as you encounter different Things. Make a list of ten "sadness things". Consider why each object makes you feel sad. Why have you chosen to keep to keep a certain Thing, even though you feel sad to look at it? Is there a "should" involved, or do you feel it will help you to heal yourself? If you feel that you "should" keep it, what is the reason why you "should"?

16) Does anyone use you as a dumping ground for their excess, useless things? Do you truly want these things? If you don't, why do you accept them if you know that you neither desire them or have a use for them yourself?

17) Have you ever gone ahead and started working even when you were so behind you never thought you could ever clean up a cluttered area? Did you keep working until you were finished or did you give up before finishing? How did this make you feel?

18) When do you usually receive mail into your hands? Do you put it down to sort later, or do you open it right away? If you allow mail to accumulate before dealing with it, where do you keep it in the meantime? When and how often do you look at e-mail? Do you feel a compulsion to check for messages frequently? Do you print out a lot of your e-mails? If you do, where do you keep the printed copies? (And, a question for myself -- How often do you clean out your in-box?)

19) What patterns can you identify in how you arrange Things? Do you leave your clutter out for all the world to see or do you hide it away in closets and drawers? Do you favor vertical or horizontal arrangements? If you stack vertically, do you pull out a bottom container, so that the rest of the stack topples?

20) How familiar with you with service centers in your area? How would you go about getting a broken thing fixed? What broken Things do you currently have in your space? Where are they stored? What do they have in common? What was your original plan for getting them fixed? At what point did they become stalled? What happened? Do you know where the warranties for your things are?

Enjoy!
Elizabeth

Stuff, the Magic Dragon...

I've been thinking a lot about "stuff" lately. I don't mean that I'm engaging in philosophical or spiritual ponderings about life. I mean that I am thinking about literal "stuff" -- furniture, floors, walls, papers, books, heirlooms, junk, paint colors, bed coverings, Christmas preparations, etc.

DH and I have been married for a wonderful twenty-seven years this month! Frankly, it's time to re-feather our nest. In the words of Edgar Guest, our seven-year-old house already shows signs of "a whole heap o' living". (What happened to that shiny new look?!) And, the old furnishings within the house are, as we say in the South, "plum wore out". Most of our things need replacing or refurbishing. It will be fun to re-vamp our dwelling as I have time and money.

Because we've moved several times in our marriage, we've been inclined to dispose of junk rather than to lug it from state to state. That has been a blessing. But even though we never tell "stuff" our latest address, it seems to seek us out, anyway. Somehow, it pushes its way into our current home in the form of little chips and wires needed for my husband's business, papers related to mine, the items that breed in a junk drawer, unwanted mail, items that simply get out of place, etc. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about!

So, while I'm itching for us to get at radical decluttering and deep cleaning, as well as home maintenance and decorating projects, I'm also pondering the role of "stuff" in my life. Of course, as a keeper at home, I was faced with this question about as soon as we got back from our honeymoon. In the course of our daily lives, we all have to set priorities for our finances. Part of that is deciding where we will live, what we will give, what we will save, and what we will spend. Part of that is deciding what "stuff" we really need and truly want and what "stuff" we can do without. The process of keeping a home neat and clean also involves deciding what to keep and what to toss. I try to keep a weekly watch on clutter, so that it does not accumulate into one huge mess.

However, this question of "stuff" has taken on a new aspect as I'm moving into that cusp between middle-age and the senior years. During this time, I've wavered between two opposing temptations.

On the one hand, as I feel the first twinges of aging in my body, I find that I crave material comfort and security more than I did when I was younger. I feel myself wanting to "settle in" and "get cozy". The thing is that I know that I can get out of balance here. It's one thing to accommodate the realities of diminishing vigor and to prepare oneself financially for the future; it's another to become self-indulgent and self-focused. If I let myself go there, I will stagnate in my relationship to God. I'll also miss out on living life to the full, as Jesus meant for us to.

Statistically speaking, if the Lord wills, I should have several productive and joyful decades ahead of me, yet. I pray to spend that time growing closer to the Lord and serving Him in whatever ways He has planned for me. (Ephesians 2:9-11) It's way too early to take to my rocking chair!

On the other hand, I'm thinking a lot about what legacy I will leave behind me one day, and I'm certain that I don't want my legacy to be a house full of "stuff". I'm a little morbidly focused on that right now, as I'm being repeatedly confronted with that old truth: You can cart it from house to house, but you really can't take it with you when you finally go!

There was a stage in my life when I attended lots and lots of weddings and baby showers and very, very few funerals. Now, I still attend weddings and baby showers, for which I am grateful to the Lord! But, as I get older, I naturally find myself going to more and more funerals. My 88 year old father attends even more.

Since my father is living in an assisted living center, and my parents-in-law are downsizing to a retirement community, I am around many people whose stewardship of earthly things is just about done. I have learned that it is a blessing when older people enter their waning years with the financial resources they need for their own care. I've also seen that when elderly people have not been able to save these resources, God can provide.

I've also seen that parents can burden their children by leaving too much stuff behind. It's hard for a grieving child to sort through a house crammed with things accumulated in his late parents' decades of marriage. If the child is under pressure to dispose of the property quickly, he or she can find it heart-wrenching to make all the little decisions required: "Should we keep this? Should we sell this in a garage sale? Should we give this to Aunt Sally? Which one of us kids should have this? Should we just throw this old thing away?"

In a time of grief, it's hard to look at stuff objectively. Even a box of papers that has no real meaning to the child or to anyone else can be hard to toss out; it feels to the child as if he is tossing out a bit of his recently departed parent along with the papers.

Also, the child or grandchild who is left to weed through the parents' stuff usually has a spouse and children to take care of, as well. Life doesn't usually stop just so that adult children can have plenty of time to think about what needs to be done with what.

So, now, when I think about buying something or if I'm deciding whether to keep something, I picture my grown children having to do something with it one day. I am one who ordinarily struggles with sentimentality when it comes to keeping books, little gifts other people have given me, books, cooking equipment, books, decorative items, books, things belonging to my now grown children and, did I say, BOOKS! So, while I may thinking a little morbidly right now, I suppose that on some level, this is good discipline for me.

I do want to be considerate of my children, here. An even better motivation might be to think about "traveling light" so that I can spend more time loving God and people while I am alive than I spend in the maintenance of things. Whenever I let clutter get out of hand, I find that things consume precious time and energy -- resources that could be spent elsewhere. The things begin to own me, and I begin to serve them, rather than using them as gifts from the Lord. An attractively neat house, in which everything is generally in place, reall does take less time to maintain than one that is perpetually untidy.

Better yet, it would be good to think about "stuff" in light of giving to those who are in real need.

This season of my life really does remind me of an important truth that Jesus told us:

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

I have many friends who traveled this weekend to the funeral of a woman who died suddenly and with no prior warnings of health problems at the age of 56. I did not know her, myself, though I do know her through the impact her life made on so many people whom I know.

Almost two decades ago, her husband had a lucrative medical practice in a large U.S. city. They gave up his large income and sold most of their possessions. They moved to the Ivory Coast of Africa, where they founded a mission clinic. I'm sure that when they left they did not know that they had found their life's work: living among and ministering to those who were suffering from the HIV/AIDS crisis there. Nor, could they have guessed that they have guessed that they would start similar hospitals in 16 other African countries or that they would raise their three children mostly on the mission field. It was only this year that they came back to work in the U.S. Of this woman, I believe that we can say, "Her treasures and her heart are in heaven, and she has only followed them to her true home."

For now, at least, dear hubby and I are where we believe God has placed us -- in the suburbs of Nashville, TN. So, in keeping with where we are placed and if the Lord wills, I do want to work on our home little by little, refurbishing our nest. At the same time, I want to keep "stuff" in its proper perspective.

Enjoy!
Elizabeth