Friday, July 31, 2015

What You CAN Take With You When You Die

Here I am again, with the boxes.

As I was purge-writing in my Morning Pages today, I decided that today I was going to dive in and start unpacking. I've moved so many times in only three years, it's become easy to put away the things that are not necessary for everyday living in a box and shove it in a corner. And then it's not only in the corner of my living place, but also in the corner of my mind. Think about this: why is it so relaxing to go away for a weekend to someone else's home or to a hotel? I'm convinced, it's because we aren't surrounded by our own crap! You don't have to see it, deal with it, make any decisions about it. You can have a great time because your mind is free! And then when you come home, there's all your crap again. Waiting for you. Is this why Jesus asked his disciples to give up all their possessions? I can only imagine that the purpose was to allow for focus and to build faith. We don't have to be attached to our things to live life. I don't think we have to give up our possessions, either. But I do believe if they distract you from what is important, then it should go.

It's time to clear the crap out. I've been putting off these decisions for a long time, because it is a hard thing to do when you don't feel like you can trust yourself. My grief created a mess in my mind- and voila! It also appeared in my living space. That is not a coincidence.

Right now I am ultra-motivated to de-clutter and live simply. My focus is coming back. It's taken a lot of time and work. I've been in this season of Winter, a period of waiting and stillness, forced to reflect and reevaluate. Since R died and my perspective on life completely changed, some of the thoughts I've wrestled with are: What do I want to do with my life? What is my purpose? What m I supposed to do?! Never mind that. What does God want me to do with my life? What is God's purpose for me?  

There have been so many different influences God put into my life to help me think it through. For instance, I attended a new member class at my church, learning and discussing the basis of the Lutheran faith. I was baptized Lutheran as an infant. My Dad is a Lutheran minister. Did I really need that class? YES. In every class or study I've attended, there is something new to learn. I could take that class ten more times and learn something new each time. I came to some realizations during that class. I have been in this confusing place, looking for a job, and also trying to figure out if I should go back to Nursing school. It was absorbing my brain. I started to question if I was really trusting God or if my god had become this worry/obsession over what I would do next with my life...

Oops. Yep. When God tells you to let go, he really means let go (Trust in The Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways submit to him and he will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6). I like to sing "Let it Go," (Yes, from Frozen) to remind myself in a humorous way, because really, I cannot get through every day without humor.

I processed through how to tell my son that things are just things, and we can't take them with us when we die. I know he might feel like I don't care about his toys and his feelings about his toys. So my plan is to remind him that Daddy didn't take any of his toys with him when he went to Heaven. And why is that? Because what Jesus wants us to care about is loving each other, not our things. We can take love and a happy soul with us to Heaven, but we cannot take our things.