Earlier this year, I made some significant and substantial changes to my life, continuing the process of growth and reflection that I started when I quit drinking almost four years ago. (Sidebar: it’s remarkable how much clarity I got, and shocking how much pain I was self medicating for so much of my life. I’m so grateful for the love and support of my friends, my wife, and my kids, who supported me when it was clear that I needed to get alcohol out of my life. Be honest with yourself: if you’re self medicating emotional pain and/or childhood trauma like I was, give some serious consideration to working on the root issues you’re using booze to avoid. I’m so much happier and healthier since I quit, and that’s almost entirely because I was able to confront, head on, why I was so sad and hurting so much of the time. I’m not the boss of you, but if you need a gentle nudge to ask for help, here it is: nudge.)
Anyway.
As I was cleaning up my emotional baggage, working on strategies to protect myself from my abusers, and practicing mindfulness daily, I realized that I had a ton of STUFF just sitting around my house, cluttering up my physical living space the way my emotional trauma and pain was cluttering up my emotional space. So I made a call, and hired a professional organizer to come to my house, go through all my bullshit with me, and help me get rid of all the things I didn’t need any more.
This process was, in many ways, a metaphor.
We spent several days going through my closets, my game room, my storage spaces in my attic and shed, and eventually ended up with FIVE TRUCKLOADS of stuff I didn’t need. Most of it was clothes and books and things that we donated to shelters, which was really easy to unload. I acquire T-shirts so much, I regularly go through my wardrobe and unload half of what I have, so it’s easy to get rid of stuff without any emotional attachments.
But there were some things that were more difficult to get rid of, things that represented opportunities I once had but didn’t pursue, things that represented ideas that I was really into for a minute, but didn’t see through to completion, things that seemed like a good idea at the time but didn’t really fit into my life, etc.
I clearly recall giving away a TON of electronic project kits to my friend’s son, because he’s 11, he loves building things, and he’ll actually USE the stuff I bought to amuse myself while I tried to make a meaningful connection to my own 11 year-old self, who loved those things back then too. When I looked at all of these things, I had to accept and admit that 47 year-old me isn’t going to make that connection through building a small robot, or writing a little bit of code to make a camera take pictures. I can still connect to that version of myself, but I do it now through therapy, through my own writing, my own meditation. For the longest time, I didn’t want to let these things go, because I felt like I was giving up on finding that connection I was seeking, but what I didn’t realize (and didn’t know until I made the decision to let it go) was that I didn’t need STUFF to recover something I’d lost and wanted to revisit.
I think that, by holding on to these kits and similar things, I was trying to give myself the opportunity to explore science and engineering and robotics in a way that young me was never given. Just about everything I wanted to do, that I was interested in when I was 11, was pushed aside, minimized, and sort of taken away from me by my parents. My dad made fun of everything I liked, and my mom made me feel like the only thing I should care about was the pursuit of fame and celebrity. Without parental support and encouragement, I never got the chance to find out if any of these other things would be interesting enough to me to think about pursuing them in higher education. Yes, for some reason, even when I was a really small kid, I was already thinking about where and when I would go to college. I never took even a single class, because I was so afraid of so many things when I was college age, but that’s its own story, for another time.
As we went through just piles and piles of bullshit, it got easier and easier to just mark stuff for donation. That drone I used to fly for fun, that I kinda sorta told myself would eventually be used to film something I wrote? Get rid of it, that’s never gonna happen. The guitar I kinda played a little bit when I was a teenager, but never really learned how to play properly? Give it to someone who is going to love it and play it so much, it lets them express their creativity in ways I was never able to. All those books I bought to make me a better poker player? Gone. All the books I bought to learn how to program in Python, Perl, Java, and even that old, used, BASIC book I picked up because I thought it would be fun to finally write that game I always dreamed about when I was ten? Give them all to someone who is actually going to do that, instead of just think about it.
It was, at first, really hard to get rid of this stuff, because I felt like I was admitting to myself that, even though I could paint all these minis (like I did when I was a teenager), even though I could study all of these books on Python and Arduino hacking, and probably make something kind of cool with that knowledge, I was never going to. I came to realize that having these things was more about holding on to the possibility that they represented. It was more about maintaining a connection to some things that once made me really happy. When I was a kid, I LOVED copying Atari BASIC programs out of a magazine and playing the games that resulted, because it was an escape from my father’s bullying and my mother’s neediness. When I was a teenager, I LOVED the time I spent (badly) painting Space Marines and Chaos Marines, because it gave me an escape from everything that was so hard about being me when I was 14. When I was in my late teens and early twenties, I spent hundreds of hours trying to learn the same five songs on the guitar, never mastering a single one of them. My time would have been much more wisely invested in learning the scales and chords that I declared were more boring than picking my way through the tablature for Goodbye Blue Sky.
And that all brings me to the thing that was simultaneously the hardest and most obvious thing to donate: all my Rock Band gear.
Did you know that the first Rock Band, which I and my kids and my friends played for literally a thousand hours, came out twelve years ago? Beatles Rock Band is a decade old this year. Rock Band 3 is ten years old, too.
I hadn’t played Rock Band in almost five years when my friend asked me what I wanted to do with all these plastic guitars, both sets of pretend drums, and all the accessories that were stacked up neatly in the corner of my gameroom.
But a decade ago, Anne and I would send the kids off to their biodad’s house, or to their friends’ for a sleepover, have some beers, and play the FUCK out of Rock Band, almost every Saturday night. My god, it was so much fun for us to pretend that we were rocking all over the world, me on the drums, Anne on the vocals. Frequently, we’d get the whole family together to play, and we’d spend an entire evening pretending to be on tour together, blasting and rocking our way through the Who, Boston, Green Day, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Dead Kennedys, and others. It brought us all closer together, and was incredibly valuable for our bonding, at a time when we really needed that.
And I was holding onto all these things, these fake plastic guitars and who even knows how many gigs of DLC, because I didn’t want to lose my connection to those days. Part of me hoped that we’d all get together and play again, like we did when my kids were in their teens, like I would when I hosted epic Rock Band parties at Phoenix Comicon, or PAX, back before the world was on fire.
But when I looked at those things, neatly stacked up and untouched except by dust for years, I knew that we weren’t going to play again, and that I didn’t need these things in my house to validate the memories.
Back in those days, when Ryan and I would spend an entire Saturday afternoon and evening trying to complete the Endless Setlist on Expert (we never did, but we got to Green Grass and High Tides more than once), real musicians would smugly tell us that we were having fun the wrong way, that we should be learning REAL instruments instead of pretending to have already mastered them. I would always argue that the whole POINT of Rock Band was the fantasy. Can you imagine telling a 100 pound kid that he should be playing real football instead of Madden? Of course not, and yet.
But it kinda turns out that some of those smug musicians were right. As I packed up those plastic fake guitars and drum kits, put them into the truck with my real guitar, I had a small twinge of regret, that I had been focused on the fantasy, instead of developing a skill that I could still use today (the last time I attempted Rock Band, maybe four years ago, I couldn’t get through a single song on Hard, much less Expert. My skills had faded, and it wasn’t worth the effort to restore them). And then I stopped myself, because that’s EXACTLY the kind of thinking that stopped me from following my dreams when I was a kid. What was important to me ten years ago, what’s still important to me today, was the time I spent with my wife, with my kids, with our family, with my friends, pretending that we were something we weren’t. We were doing something together, and that is what matters. Today, I can’t recall anything specific about all the nights Anne and I played, though I know we worked our way through hundreds of songs together. But I can clearly recall how much fun it was.
Ryan and I still talk about the time I accidentally turned the Xbox off, when I meant to just power down my toy guitar, after we’d been trying to play the Endless Setlist on Expert for five hours.
Over the years, I had accumulated all this stuff that I was unwilling to let go of, because I felt like that would also mean letting go of the memories that were associated with those things. I felt like getting rid of things without following through on their intended use was admitting defeat, or being a quitter.
But after a year or so of daily, intense, therapy and reflection, after ending contact with toxic and abusive people who were exerting tremendous control over me, these things stopped being the keys to unopened doors, and they just became THINGS that I had to constantly move around to get them out of my way. Because I didn’t need them anymore. I don’t need to paint minis like I did when I was 15, because I’m not 15. I’m not living with an abuser and his enabler. I’m not working for a producer who makes it clear to me at every opportunity that he owns me and has complete control over whether or not I’ll have a film career. And I don’t need to paint those minis now, to honor and care for the memory of the 15 year-old I was. The best way to care for him is to care for me, so that the pain he endured is not for nothing.
I didn’t need ANY of these things, and once I realized that, unloading them and getting them to people who DO need them felt as freeing and empowering as writing a goodbye letter.
I kept a few things that were still useful, or brought me joy. Books, mostly, and of course all my dice and games. Lots of records, even some cassettes. It felt GOOD to admit that I’m never going to learn guitar, or build an Arduino-controlled anything. It felt GOOD and empowering to know that I’m a writer. I get my joy and explore my possibilities through storytelling and character development. THAT is what I love, and by getting rid of all this old stuff (and its emotional baggage) I created space in my life to be the person I am now, a person I love, in a life that is amazing.
I still have some emotional clutter, which is to be expected and isn’t a big deal. The really cool thing is that I have physical and emotional space, now, to deal with it.
You are a braver person then I am, Wil. Thank you for letting us know what can happen when you unload the physical stuff that you don’t really need or want, no matter how much you want to need or want it.
Whew. I need to declutter. We bought a bigger house last year. I still can’t put it all “away”. It makes me sad to look at many of these things and I didn’t know why until I read this. It needs to go away. Thanks for sharing!
This was really great to read, Wil, and I’m glad you’re doing well.
At the age of 33, I’m in the middle of my second divorce. Most of my belongings are in a storage unit, while I’m spending time at my parents house, regrouping.
I go to my storage unit maybe once a week or two to pick something up, and I stand there and look, and I just have so. Much. Stuff.
I’m working really hard on letting go of things, and it is hard sometimes. I have a collection of Funko Pops that got way out of hand, and I’m trying very hard to cull it way down. I have to tell myself that just because I sell pops based off The Matrix or Space Ghost it Spider-Man, doesn’t mean I’m not a fan of those properties.
Dec 20, 2019 I will be celebrating 2 years sober. Despite losing my sponsor this year because she herself fell off the wagon so she was no longer qualified to be a sponsor to anybody. So losing my sponsor to relapse was hard for me. Also hard for me was losing my mother in May this year during the month of Mother’s Day. The day after my mom was buried I was sexually assaulted and my IPad Pro with my Graduate work and Senior Thesis I needed to graduate this Oct was robbed. Because of the robbery and having my federal disability rights violated by my school I was not able to graduate in October which I found hugely disappointing. It really has been a really challenging year but so far I haven’t said I give up or relapse myself. 2019 has been quite the journey. I wonder what 2020 will bring?
When you mention 5 truckloads of belongings letting go I wonder was it some sort of hoarding behavior? Also, 5 truckloads of stuff sounds very expensive. I wonder with that much money how perhaps it would have been better spent on things more soul fulfilling? Just some things your words had me wondering about?
Wil, thanks so much for writing this. Your experiences and progress are an encouragement. I’m going through my 88 year old mom’s house bit by bit sorting and donating. It’s good to know that it can be freeing.
Good piece. Isn’t it strange how it takes so many of us so long to figure out ourselves? My experience, of course, is totally different, yet oddly similar. I wish I’d had tried to work things out at 47. Good luck, buddy!
It’s hard to break away (I left more baggage than I’d like to admit on the east coast putting a continent between) but sometimes it’s necessary. Many dreams were squashed, belittled, ignored or ridiculed but as I’ve often been told I can be a stubborn b***h, shields up, head down, keep going each step a little closer to distant seemingly unreachable goals. College being one of them.
I don’t know where you’re located but I found UCLA Extension classes to be an awesome venue to explore possibilities, learn new things, sharpen innate skills previously not allowed to grow freely, with like minded adults, many of whom have family or personal connections to the industry and who, for one reason or another didn’t have college options available as younger versions of themselves.
Never give up your dreams. Through art and the written word we reach heights we could never achieve any other way and it’s well worth it no matter how long it takes to get there, one little step at a time.
I am going to do some purging this weekend, this is the nudge I needed. Thanks, Wil!
You sound like you could be my twin, tho I am almost the same age as Anne.Thank you for sharing this, you have no idea how nice it it to know at least one person in this world understands what it is like. Everytime I wonder if leaving my parents and ex was a bad idea, I read your blogs and realize it was not. Thank you for the encouragement.I really hope you do write more, stories, I know I would love to read them. Tho, I admit at least one of the ones you wrote was too scare, I am a wuss. lol ….and thank you and Anne for showing me that love can happen for people with anxiety issues. Good luck to you both! Your long long time fan,Renee
<3
Woah, you’ve just clarified a lot of things for me. Thank you so much for sharing this, both here and on your tumblr as well (where i happened to stumble across it) <3
This will be helpful to many. Carry on.
Great piece Wil. There was a lot I could relate to (alcohol, stuff issues) and one point Id like to throw out there that seems to be the opposite, but related, if thats OK. but first the similarities.
I drank like a fish when i was undiagnosed bipolar. It was my mid twenties, so sort of by default, there were some absolutely amazing times. sex drugs and rock and roll!
When i was diagnosed, and got a good doc and meds… i STILL drank like a fish, but many times it ended awfully. I kept trying to figure out why, and finally realized, it was because I was late 30s. I was no longer drinking to medicate (thank goodness), and i wasnt even drinking for fun – I was drinking to turn back the clock to a time when i was young, healthy, and popular, and did not have any (known, and it was much milder then) mental illness that made social interaction difficult. I got lucky that (with panic disorder and social anxiety disorder as well) there was only one sports bar where i had MY seat, with my back to a wall so no one could touch me unseen, and i could see the exit/escape route.. etc… and their cooler blew up right as the landlord raised rent so they just went out of business.
I salute your initiative and self awareness to call a professional. I went through a dramatic “stuff removal” process, when i was evicted! All of those rare books, lovecraft from the 20s, dunsany and machen from even earlier, etc MY LIFE, most of my clothes, all of my music, all of the things that i thought defined me, gone. I escaped with a few trash bags of clothes, which i made a pile out of to sleep on at a foreclosure house with no internal walls, heating or air.
Amazingly, once the shock wore off, i had a hard time even listing off the items I had lost. And losing some rare japanese import cd of a band didnt make me like their music less, or remove its influence on me as a person.
The place where we differ interests me, and maybe you too? question mark?
While you seem to have been acquiring items to get a 2nd change to connect with 11 year old Wil, all of my focus was on the future – as far off as possible. Things i had zero interest as a dnd commodore 64 geek as a kid – art, photography, languages, writing, music. My addiction to stuff was all based around these long, long term hail mary goals, that i could re-invent myself and just… not be me. I just didnt want to be me, and so to “fix” that, I needed to latch onto something cool i have never done, and become “that guy”. WOW matt speaks 7 languages! But the essential element in the delusion was to make it so long long long term goal, so i never had to do any actual work, never had to pay attention to the present, and never had to feel any sense of failure since i had no schedule.
I am still working on that one. I want to partake in activities along those lines, but my brain just so easily spirals into these fantasies of future glory. Just recently I came close to buying almost $550 in camera equipment. Then a friend luckily said, why dont you just spend $10 on a book about using Lightroom to modify the crappy photos you take with the camera in the closet that is bad but fine for learning Lightroom w a photog emphasis. I hate logic! The drug-like immediate gratification of dropping $550 on stuff i know ill never use is hard to resist. Buying a cheap book which then begins to taunt me, “Why arent you learning Lightroom? Why cant you find 15 minutes a day? YOU SUCK!” is harder.
but i went with the $10 book (taunting, mocking) so i am making progress. But i am still struggling to motivate myself to READ IT… because it is mundane and not epic and not far off in the future.
My life is relatively great; I do not understand why I spend so much time and effort avoiding the present, other than it can lead to disappointment and loss of self esteem. Living in daydreams of the future is safe, warm, like being in a Hot Pocket of Hope (thats cooled from lava to room temp)
So good, so brave. Whenever you share with us I learn something. Thank you! I’m trying to de-crapify my house and, like you, I find that it is possible to let go of stuff when you have learned what you needed to know from it. It may not be finished. But I am done and ready to move on.
Wil, you seem to be a slightly younger version of me. I have been dealing with, what I assume, to be very similar issues as yours. Childhood BS, leading to self doubt, hiding from and running from dealing with it. Trust me, I’m not making light of it. I got stories. Just today I had an inner conversation about, “can I drink and still get better”?. Me, I seriously doubt it, but here I am drinking and typing. I’ll stop here, but say, somehow I need to muster the courage to pull the plug. Keep on keeping on.
Thank you for sharing Wil.
I’m sure a lot of readers can tell similar stories OR need to do the same. I’ll limit my comments to the ones I feel strongest about:
I reached the “I will get rid of stuff” stage many years ago, but I rarely have the time to do it properly, so the progress is slow. [I learned that rushing it leads to regrets.]
The items that are toughest for me are the ones that need to go to the right person. [there are many types of stuff that thrift stores will just toss or will get destroyed before getting bought or or some dealer will snap it up for 1% of it’s resale value I’ve helped at thrift stores and Friends of Libraries – at the FOTL I’ve pulled many books out of the recycle bin that I sold and made $50 to $300 for the library – some other volunteer thought they were too dated or too tattered].
Two examples of items that took years to find the right person and I’m glad I waited.
1 – My D&D fifth edition (pre dice and the tokens were uncut). I gave it to a 16 year old for whom D&D was his only escape from a toxic and controlling family. [I found out about the kid while volunteering for the Friends of the library] The look of joy was worth the 15 year wait.
2 – My large 1950s vintage erector set (in the heavy steel box) that I was given after an older cousin found other interests. [Antique stores were asking $400 or more for that set.] I gave it to a friends daughter who like to make things – After it was her favorite toy for four or five years she told me that she was going to save it for HER daughter. [It got extremely dusty in the room after she said that.]
It is the beginning or the Middle but your journey is halfway over , Stop now smell the roses and go on a vacation where your not working just on vacation . Excuse my poor grammar . But the cathartic cleansing you just went through is important .
Thank you for sharing your story. You’re an amazing human being and you shine a light into my life every time I read one of your posts. You are courageous and brave and you shine the light, and light the way, for others to heal themselves.
I really want to hope that this inspires me to get right of all the junk I have in my Room of Requirement. I try to do this every once in a while but maybe this will provide the push I need. Thanks, Wil. Your posts always resonate with me. You are a righteous dude!
Bravo, sir.
Decluttering. It’s so much more than the mere word seems to convey.It summons questions of The Purge, and what may have informed your decisions and further commitment to quit drinking (if I may state it plainly). Was the decision by you alone? I mean it must be in the final sense. But was any outside influence noticed, or help offered?Perhaps someone said something that rang a bell, or lit a light bulb over your head, so to speak?
–I believe I’m beginning to experience something similar on the home front. Having notes could help.
I have an Arduino in a Drawer. Did give away the Rock Band stuff now that Boy has moved out. You’re right it’s so hard to give up the object the memories are attached to, but harder for me is the feeling I wasted the money I bought the stuff with and didn’t make any memories with it
This is like looking into a mirror. I’ll have to think about some things now. And to sort out stuff from the past. Much stuff.
Such a beautiful, poignant story of self-awakening. Tears here.
Letting go is the hardest part and you have done it! well done! it doesn’t matter how long it takes as we are all different <3
Something that you said about going to college… I never went to college or university as I didn’t believe in myself to any good at academic stuff, even though I did do Physics at school, rather proud of that as back in the early ’80’s that was a no no! I wanted to work with computers and back then you had to have physics to do it! I am terrible at Maths and so so at English… well I decided back in 2006 to go University, in the UK we have something called the Open University (OU) where as long as you went to school and got some exams when leaving you can do a degree! So I signed up and 5 yrs later doing it part time I got my degree! may only be a grade 4 but I passed and can now use BSc at the end of my name… rather proud of that! I am now doing my second degree with them. 🙂
Rather a ramble there but what I am saying is have you thought about doing a degree now? On your own terms not anyone elses… I won’t put a link as Akismet hates them…LOL… but look them up they also have a great student support I am classed as a Disabled Student and so get extra support and help during the year including phone calls from them to make sure you are doing ok and if they can help at all… never heavy handed either… if you do have any questions please ask and I can give you more info… I am not pushing at all but I have a feeling that like me you love to learn new things and had an enquiring mind. 🙂
Sorry for rambling
Kriss 🙂
Great post, and fascinating. The declutter movement seems to be quite a powerful force, and I’m not sure I agree with all of it, but i do kind of like the ‘if it doesn’t bring you joy, get rid of it’ thing – its just that I think i disagree about what bringing me joy actually means. Some of the things that bring me joy I know I won’t actually get to – like the beat up old guitar that I’ve promised myself I’ll restore – even though its beat up and sounds terrible, and I may not get to it – the thought of it going to landfill makes me sad, so i keep it, and it brings me joy even in the state its in now. similarly, though i sold a ton of old lead miniatures, I kept more than i’ll ever paint – they bring me joy even sitting in a sealed box waiting for the day to be released!
I still have physical baggage I need to get rid of….clothes, shoes, jewelry. What my parents did to me (maybe and probably unintentionally) can, in my case, have lasting effects in my life. I still carry that crap around and I’m 65yo. Your blog post was right on the target! GET RID OF IT!!!!
Thank you for sharing this week – going through a similar awakening here and I really resonated with how you separated doing something you love vs holding onto it as a sense of possibility. So so so helpful.
That was powerful to read because of your honesty about sharing your thought processes with us, Wil. I’ve mentioned before that I’m dealing with an ‘adult’ son learning to deal with mental illness and reading about your path, even though it’s not the same as his, has been a help. Thank you for sharing yourself with us.
Thank you for sharing that. I will get rid of some stuff on my day off. And more stuff on my next day off.
Thank you, Wil. This has been a gentle reminder for me to do my own cleansing of remembrance items that I don’t really need. Especially, because I haven’t seen most of them in years anyway, being that they’re all packed away. Thank you for the motivational push.
thank you for this.
I needed to read this. Thanks for sharing sir.
I was just thinking about Rock Band earlier. I had a blast first time I got to play Rock Band 2 at a friend’s party, and I really wanted to be able to play it any time I wanted. I ended up getting a Wii (our first and so far only console; I’m a diehard PC gamer), and then having a hell of time finding Rock Band instruments, though I eventually found a set on Kijiji and drove across town to pick it up.
And then I ended up hardly ever playing it, because I had young kids who always wanted to play it with me, and they weren’t very good at it and so we would keep losing unless I turned on No-Fail mode, and it became less fun for me. Sometimes I would end up at home alone, and then I would dig it out and play for a bit, just on vocals or on drums, and make sure to put it away before they came home. But mostly it just sat around. Then our guitar’s dongle died, and I ordered another one from eBay but it never worked, so by the time I actually thought my kids might be able to do a decent job, it didn’t work any more. (We have Lego Rock band and Beatles Rock Band by that point, but we’d never got very far in either of them.) Our Wii is basically DOA right now too, and probably it’s time to put it away/get rid of it and its games (we could use that shelf space for DVDs by this point). Maybe one day we’ll get a Switch or something.
Meanwhile, I’m doing karaoke regularly (and don’t I wish I started doing this years ago), and the singing was always the best part anyway. My daughter’s learning the guitar, and I’m trying hard not to be the pushy dad who makes her fulfill the musical dreams I’ve mostly abandoned.
Can’t begin to tell you how this on point this post was for me. Thank you for sharing.
This is going to sound weird, but these words reach me in the places I run from.
Dammit, Wil, you hit me right in the feels. Again. I’m just a few years younger than you, and have followed your life and career since SBM. Thank you for standing up, speaking out, and being a positive role model for our generation.
You’re getting closer to enlightenment. 🙂 I am glad that you have given up the booze. And have found the strength to get rid of your belongings. It isn’t easy to give up stuff. I hope you find the strength not to impulse buy when in stores.
Anyway, as you know, we don’t need a bunch of stuff to make us happy. I learned to let stuff go after my dog had died. Which is a weird thing to trigger it. But, it helped me realize that we can’t take our stuff with us after death. And, we leave it as a burden for our loved ones to get rid of, which is difficult for them. I guess.
I am currently doing another purge. I plan on attending an art school in New York. I can’t bring everything with me since New York apartments are on the small size. And, I currently live in a house, so there is too much stuff. Even though, I had done a previous purge… I find the 2nd purge to be more difficult. Mostly… because I have to get rid of more stuff than before. I will probably end up starting over from square one, when it comes to furniture. The thought of this, kinda makes me want to throw up. I know what makes me happy, too. Books, art supplies, and photography/film are what I love the most.
The road to happiness isn’t always smooth. But… it is one hell of a journey.
‘Sounds’ easy enough. Getting rid of stuff, I mean. Actually doing it is the most difficult part. Getting over any object sentimentality can be a dilemma. I have tried to shut it off many times but it always comes back. So I, at my age, have decided to allow my descendants ‘benefit’ from their findings.
I would love for your blog to be audio and read by you.
Our entire goddamn species needs to declutter. We’re completely upside-down and we’re drowning in useless crap. It makes us sad. So, we buy more crap. We’re out of time. It is beyond madness that we’re filling the oceans and our skies with our shit.
I love books. Several years ago, I got rid of all my books. Thirty boxes. Worth a bit of money. Rare. One-offs and such. I treasured every one of them. I couldn’t bear to drizzle, niggle, haggle them out over a period of years to the unwashed swine, so I took them all down to the local library and left them on the loading dock for donations. To this day, it burns… like I lost a child. I regret it, but it was necessary.
But did you ever learn to play the drums?
Wonderful post, thank you ❤️
I’m reminded of an aspect of my own personal situation:
At the moment, I am unhoused (the diplomatic term for “homeless”).
In such a situation, it is an unavoidable reality that your possessions must be reduced and consolidated down to the most basic necessities.
There is only so much one human being can carry on a regular basis–and I limit myself to a single bag in order to avoid standing out.
It is not so much that I am embarrassed by my circumstances (though I would be lying if I said I were not at all)…
It is more to the point that I do not wish to impose my problems on everyone around me, nor do I wish to be assessed based upon my living situation.
For the most part, no one is aware of my circumstances unless I tell them–and I only do that when it is unavoidable.
My point being: It is truly amazing when you realize how little STUFF you actually need… especially when you tend to accumulate large quantities of stuff.
It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that I have had to abandon perhaps 99.999% of the material possessions I have acquired over 42 years of life…
…and it didn’t kill me!😲
I like stuff. I miss much of the stuff I have had to abandon, and I intend to get more stuff once I have somewhere to put it.
But I don’t NEED it.
We are an acquisitive culture–the idea that we perpetually need more and more stuff is ingrained into us from childhood… it’s what keeps our economies going.
And most of us NEVER question this.
It takes a serious upheaval in one’s life before most of us will have to confront the “Truth About Stuff”.
You realized stuff was impeding your personal growth and self-improvement.
I had no choice but to give up my stuff.
Your way showed courage and self-awareness…while mine was imposed upon me.
But regardless, liberation from enslavement to stuff is wonderful…and I am so glad you are experiencing it🙂
Oh, gosh. This is me, 63 years old and still thinking I’ll finish my dissertation. Or write articles. Or do anything to stop feeling like a failure. Thank you so much for writing this.
Once I publish my current book, in the new year, this is what I plan to do next – declutter my house. Well, my part of it. My husband’s office will doubtless remain a hoarder’s den that I don’t even enter anymore, but I can handle my part. I have so much stuff in my craft room that I can’t find what I want when I want it. This, indeed, makes us sad. I look forward to it, but I definitely have to publish the book FIRST.
An amazing post. I had several reactions to reading it, but thoroughly enjoyed every word. My heart hurt to realize that the adults in your young life were abusive and manipulative. I’m sorry that you were not surrounded by nurturing and loving people who would have encouraged you to do what makes you happy. Because you were deserving of that. It explains a lot about your adult anxiety and the struggles with depression and self-worth. As a mom, it makes me want to hug that 11-year old and tell him he is amazing and funny, and his interests were creative and imaginative. But we can’t go back except in reflection.
Another reaction was recognizing how wise you are. They say with age comes wisdom, a concept with which I am not entirely in agreement. I’ve known some young people who were insightful and brilliant, and some elders who have not acquired knowledge or understanding in their advanced years. I think it can happen at any age for the individuals who are brave enough to observe, learn and self-correct. Introspection is a valuable tool if used correctly. Too much can be borderline narcissistic, and too little is being unwilling or unable to honestly grade ourselves as humans and therefore learn by it. You have a finely tuned ability to reflect on both good and bad times, decide what is valuable to embrace and necessary to remove, and become the best you. This may sound entirely weird, and I certainly don’t mean it in a creepy fan-girl way, but……. I’m so fond of you.
And lastly……I had a visceral reaction to getting rid of STUFF. So much I have kept that I don’t need, and where to start!! But then they say ‘How do you eat an elephant?’ I need to take the first bite.
Good stuff Wil. I make “the purge” an annual ritual, usually to start the new year.
Way to Go Wil. That is so awesome. I love your blogs about working through stuff (pun intended). I loved the part where you wrote about the realization that the Rock Band stuff had value because the memories with your family are valuable. I was thinking it as I read the first part of the paragraph and I mentally cheered when I read the realization. Hoooray! Thanks so much for sharing your journey. It has made me think about why I keep the things I do.