Thank you John Mariotti
Sunday Story…Stuff
I have a lot of stuff. Books, cds, knick knacks, bric-a-brac, tschotkes, junk, stuff. I have tried to eliminate a lot of my stuff but it just seems to continue to multiply. I fear it may take a concerted effort on my part to really get to the bottom of all my stuff and get rid of it. It will take a decision to jettison it, to release it back from where it came. And in that release I will let go of all the things that stuff carries along with it. The memories, the little tendrils of hope and pain and success and failure. Because tied up in all that stuff is a life that has been lived. Maybe that is why all that stuff is there…it represents the life that has already gone before.
There is other stuff I am carrying around in my life. It is the stuff I carry inside of me. The stuff I have picked up over the last few decades, especially when I was a little person. This stuff I picked up to keep me safe, to keep my hopes and dreams alive, to keep me functioning in a confusing and difficult world. This stuff is the decisions I made as 5 or 10 or 15 year old about the world and the way it works. And now at 50+ years old my life is still being ruled by the decision a 5 year old made based on some event (good or bad) that happened to him.
Huh? I mean seriously…a 5 year olds decision is running my life? Think about it…Maybe one of your parents left you at that age…your 5 year old made that mean something to him or her. That child made that event mean something…love isn’t real, people who love you leave, I am not worthy of love, I don’t count. And from that meaning that child begins to live a life. And he or she makes decisions based on those meanings. And for all the years forward the decision that get made are made with that meaning in mind.
This is an integral part of our human condition…we make meaning. We create a story about events so that we can make sense of the world and understand our place in it. These stories become our stuff. And our stuff becomes more ingrained into our lives and gets really difficult to change as time goes on. That is assuming we can even recognize it as stuff. Because we train ourselves to think that this stuff is real and real important to us. We even let this stuff become who we are…it defines us.
Does your furniture define you? Does the house you live in or the car you drive create the person you are? No they don’t. The person you are defines the house and the car not the other way around. But we let this other stuff, stuff we picked up 10 or 20 or 30 years ago drive our lives and set the parameters or who we are capable of being. What if you had other stuff? What if you decided today that the stuff you are carrying around isn’t really yours anymore? What if you just took all that stuff out to the curb on trash day and left it to be taken away? Now what?
Now you get to decide who and what you are to be. You see getting rid of that other stuff…the boxes in the garage, the bags hanging around in the closet, the piles of things gathering dust on the shelves are holding space for the things that might really please you, might really bring joy and harmony to your world. Getting rid of your psychic junk does the same thing…if you create a new meaning, new story about the events in your life you are changing your past. And when you change the past you change the future. By eliminating all that old stuff you get to make room for the stuff that is going to serve the you that is here now, not the you of 45 years ago. The question is…do you dare?
Do you have the courage to recreate your life? Do you have the courage to be the person you really and truly want to be? Most of us are so in love with our stuff, so enamored of the people that our stuff has had us become that chucking that stuff away is just too frightening. This is the creation of a new you, one that does and says things in an adult way in a way that serves the integrated whole.
Do you dare become who you really want to be? What will you do without all that stuff holding you down and molding you into some person a 5 year old thought it would be safe to be? Do you really want to go on being that person? It’s safe and comfortable, granted, but is it really serving you in a way that has you living a life of optimum health and fitness? You see health and fitness isn’t just about your physical body…it is the whole package...mind, body and soul. All healthy, all fit, all working at their very highest and best.
Why not take all that old stuff and put it on the curb? Start with the physical stuff…all the junk lying around your house and garage and get rid of it….make room for stuff that will be more fun and alive. Then go upstairs in your mind and start cleaning out those old stories and ancient movie reels and make room for some new ones. Then get started on your soul. What beliefs and suppositions are you walking around with that really aren’t yours anymore. You might as well find some new ones of those too.
Riddle me this Batman…Who are you going to be when you get to be who you really ought to be?
Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
http://www.martialartsnevada.com/
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