Things

Why are we so attatched to our things? I look around me now as I prepair to put all of my things into boxes, to sell some of it and to give much away, it all seems such a burden. Do my things tell the story of who I am? Do they represent me? Are they me? Really they are just things. Some of it I bought out of need, like my big spaghetti pot. Some of it I bought out of whim, my blue shirt with only one sleeve for instance that I never wear. Some of my things have deep meaning to me. They speak to me when I look at them, they have stories and my heart swells to know that they are in my possession.

Possession. Such a strange feeling. We can posses something, yet why are we compelled to possess another human being? I wonder. I categorize and lable and look and prioritize my things. I know what I can and cannot live without. Or do I? What can you live or live without? I suppose this will be tested in a short time for me and I think that I will do fine with less things than with more. To let go of my material possession to be free of consumer bondage. It is a sweet feeling. Of course if I was really serious about this monastic episode I would get rid of it all. But I still have attatchments. I told the lady in the dry cleaning shop that I had no attatchments but that is a lie. Right now I am going to carve into my perceptions of attatchments and see how deep I can go. How much I can let go. What can I live without? What do I have to know is in boxes back home waiting for me to return to?

We all build up personas and wear masks. Its how we survive. Its what we are taught to do in this culture. But I know that I am more than the make-up I put on my face and the style of clothes that I put on my body and the things I present in my home. I am so much more. So we shall see what it is like to let go of things. To be without things. To know what the limits are. I really wonder how much I can part with and what I will have to keep.

M