looseframing

why do we keep them? hoard them? what makes us hang onto random stuff for years? and then what makes us suddenly go through a purging stage and dump things? we do that and feel good, clean — when before we couldn’t even consider letting go of what we just tossed or gave away or whatever.

yeah, i just had a purging moment. do you have any idea how many rocks i had collected over the years? seriously. rocks are cool, and can be gorgeous and/or just weird (and thus snazzy for their oddness), but almost every surface in my house had oodles of rocks perched on it. many of which i had not really looked at in years.

so many of them now live in my yard. (-; some evoked memories of past camping trips and hikes — so a few got saved for that. others got saved because they are just too cool to get rid of. but many are just…. pretty rocks. some i have had since way back when i was a kid and had a rock polisher.

they have all been packed up and moved several times, have been dusted and displayed around the house… and mostly, ignored. but i could never get rid of them. until yesterday.

it felt good to purge. i feel lighter, cleaner. i like knowing what rocks are actually still here, and why they are. i like that there is now less clutter on shelves and window sills and other surfaces. so why now? why let go now? why did i hold onto that stuff for so long?

what is it with humans and hoarding and purging cycles? i felt no pain yesterday dumping the rocks i did — but that action was inconceivable before then. what shift in us that lets us finally let go?