joy is not in things, it is in us
"Why do you spend your money on that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?" - from Isiah 55:1-5
Stuff. Ugh.
When I get ready to clean my house, I realize that of all the tasks there are to do: washing dishes, wiping down countertops, washing windows, mopping floors, cleaning sinks and toilets, ironing … the only task I really dread is figuring out what to do with all the stuff that makes it hard to keep the house clean. Sitting right now at my kitchen island, a quick scan tells me there are more than 50 things sitting on the countertops. And that's if I count a crock holding 20 kitchen utensils as just one item.
I just cleaned in here! At our house we call it the curse of horizontal surfaces.
I wonder sometimes how this became normalized. I wonder if you also feel tension between a compulsion to keep buying things, and a gut level aversion to doing so. I do well for a while in not buying stuff for myself, but then feel guilty if I don't buy stuff for someone else (who is also struggling with affluenza). Yet I wonder if the gifts I buy feel like the burden of more stuff to the recipient?
I also struggle with what to do with the thoughtful (but unneeded) things that come into our home regularly as gestures of kindness. How long do I hold on to something that I don't need, just because it feels wrong to not keep a gift? Ugh. Stuff!
When it comes to gift-giving, at our house we have been trying to move our expectations from things to experiences. Rather than buying a child yet another toy, why not a shared outing tailored to that child's interests? Of course, in the age of coronavirus, that is now much more difficult. Ugh.
I am left today with many questions.
Questions for Today
Do I give the people who love me what they most want from me?
Am I able to spend the time I need to build special relationships with the people I love?
Are things sometimes a substitute for "being there" with the ones I love?
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