Don’t buy me greeting cards.

I hate greeting cards. Absolutely hate them. The idea of picking the perfect one out of the 20 you have to choose from at the store makes me anxious. And when I find one with an appealing cover, I open it up and what is written inside is mediocre. I end up having to compromise between design and words because words mean more to me than the cover. Then, I turn the card over and see that it’s $5.99 US. I DIDN’T EVEN PICK THE SPARKLY ONE!! I’ve just stopped. If you don’t believe me, ask my friends. At their child’s birthday party if they come across a present without a card (and they do) they say “This must be from Jen.”…you are 100% correct. But even out of all of that, the thing that I hate most about greeting cards, is (when I receive one) having to decide when/if to throw it away. Or if it’s going to go in the box with the other 100 greeting cards that I can’t seem to throw away are stored.

It’s not just greeting cards I have a hard time throwing away/getting rid of, but I used to be a lot worse when I was younger. Every summer I remember my parents making me clean my side of the basement that had boxes full of stuff that I kept. Some normal things (pictures, barbies, a lot of the stuff mentioned in my last post) and some questionable things (old homework assignments, roller blades and my favorite t-shirt from 4th grade [both which that didn’t fit me anymore], a dried up/broken Sand Art picture frame that I begged my parents for). My room was atrocious also. It was so packed full of stuff that you couldn’t walk to my bed, or sometimes you couldn’t even shut the door. It would take me days to clean my room before I could have a friend sleep over and most of it I would just shove in my closet to keep it out of sight. Why was I keeping everything if I was just shoving it places like my closet, the basement, and underneath my bed? Did I even really need it?

I had trouble getting rid of things that I believed I could/would use in the future. Yes, that included homework assignments (because I’ll need to know how to find the Sine, Cosine and Tangent after I’m graduated!) and broken things that I swear I would fix. Lets be real, if it was in 2 or more pieces, I was going to lose AT LEAST one of the pieces because I was so disorganized. I also had trouble getting rid of things that others would give to me (greeting cards, stuffed animals, jewelry) even if that person was no longer in my life or I no longer had a use for the items. So, stuff kept building up. And then when I was moving out of my parents house the first time, I realized…I did NOT want to take all of that stuff with me. And I couldn’t just leave it at my parents house, because they weren’t going to go through it/use it. It was MY stuff, and I had to deal with it. And the only way I could deal with it was by going through each thing and debunking/confronting my beliefs about that thing.

After going through my stuff, it was easy for me to get rid of things that I purchased or created once I had realized why I was keeping things in the first place. I realized I had believed that those items were pieces of my past that represented a portion of my identity that I was holding on to. And if I got rid of it, I would lose that part of me…as if the memory never happened. I would forget who I was. This played a part into getting rid of things that people had gotten for me as well. I believed if I got rid of that stuffed animal from the Roller Rena my friend gave me at the 5th grade field trip, that that meant I did not care about them or our friendship. And if they found out that I got rid of it, I feared they would be disappointed.

I followed a simple guideline that I felt comfortable with. I kept what I had touched only in the last 6 months. And if there were MEMORIES that felt I needed to keep, I have ONE TOTE of things dedicated to the items that mean the MOST to me (my cheerleading pompoms, a letter from Lucas, a video of me on Slime Time Live). I allowed myself for example (if I had multiple) ONE of my favorite beanie babies, and donated the rest of them (to kids who would enjoy them as much as I did but didn’t have the means to). BUT if items started not fitting in the tote (and it didn’t have a use anywhere else, or I haven’t touched it in over 6 months) I analyzed and I got rid of something. And I do this now about every 6 months.

I just recently read in a book called “The Serving Mindset” by Farnoosh Brock that your identity is a sum of your gifts and talents, strength and abilities, experiences and expertise. That statement does not say my identity is a bracelet that doesn’t fit that my ex-boyfriend gave to me in kindergarten (I will be throwing that out after I publish this because I still have it in my armoire…). I also feel there are many better ways to actually show people I care about them instead of guilting myself into keeping their birthday card they got me 6 years ago…they probably don’t even remember giving it to me anyway. It has been amazing how much weight and guilt has lifted off of my shoulders. And since I have less now, I am able to focus and appreciate more on what I do have. Now, will there be exceptions to the rule? I’m sure there will be, but the other thing I remind myself is that when I leave this world, I can’t take my things with me. And tomorrow is never promised.

Is there something that you should get rid of that is no longer serving you?