Lessons...

Part of my yearly hold on to joy with both hands and snarl if anyone gets too close thing this year is this little book I found A Year of Positive Thinking:Daily Inspiration, Wisdom, and Courage (A Year of Daily Reflections), little book long title. Anyway, I found this little book and thought I'd treat it like a daily devotional thing from my old religious day.

In daily devotions you are given a bible verse to read and you write out some reflections on it. You do it either first thing to start your day thinking about god or last thing to end it that way. Look, I don't want to say it's a cult, but there are so many things that you do that just keep you focused only on religious thought that it's awfully like a cult. I mean, daily devotions, keep your mind right.

So anyway...when I was younger I had multiple daily devotional books. Some were just verses, some were verses and little mini lessons. But I always did like the idea of them as a part of centering your thoughts. It's part of where my gratitude practice came from. What you think about becomes what you do.

So positive thinking. I figured I would read the positive quote or lesson for the day and write a few sentences about it. I know it's going to be difficult to stay positive this year. He hasn't even taken office yet and it's already been a firehose of WHAT? while the Congress is busy putting together their new agenda. First bill to pass will be one that let's local police act like Border Patrol on steroids. Accused of a crime? Deported. Do not pass go, do not expect due process. Just the accusation and you are out. They are calling it the Laken Riley Act so that they can shame anyone who doesn't vote to pass it, oh this dead girl means nothing to you? Well, guess what, it's already a thing that if an immigrant is convicted of a felon they are then deported. We don't need another law on it. And this one is, again, not just convicted, it's accused.

And...so... yeah.

Positive thinking.

And as you all know I believe the universe is always trying to teach us lessons and I got one from this experiment already. The pen I've been using has been crapping out. I'm not sure if it's running out of ink, or if the roller ball is wonky, or what it is, but it skips spaces. You know? Like you are writing and it hits pat of the letter but doesn't get it all. So you stop, scribble a little to get everything flowing, and write again. Over and over and over again.

Which I've been doing all week.

Until finally yesterday I said out loud, THROW THE PEN AWAY. And I did. And this morning with my new pen in hand I wrote a few lines on the daily thought and it was smooth and easy.

But throwing away that pen was hard. I knew from about day two that it was crapping out. I've got a whole page of scribble marks where I'd have to stop and start again. That pen was probably 6 years old. I got it for free. But throwing out things is hard for me. Even things that are worn out. Or that I don't use anymore. It's part of the legacy of growing up poor. And I know that. And it was a reasonable reaction to not knowing if you could get something to replace the thing that was breaking down or wearing out.

And even now that I could just get new things for the most part, it's responsible. I fix things, or clean them up, or decide I don't really even need something like that, before I just buy a new one.

But it's okay to get rid of things that aren't working anymore. It's okay to let things go. Even if I had paid a lot for that pen (which I say it was free, but technically it was from a hotel so if you counted all the costs involved in getting it, it was a pretty expensive pen) even though I got that pen at an expensive destination. It wasn't working anymore. And I have other pens that are working.

Don't keep things that don't work. There are other things waiting to add value to your life. But first you have to let go of the things that don't serve you anymore.

It's something I talk about all the time. But sometimes I forget to do it. I forget that it's not just big philosophies that might not be serving me anymore. Sometimes it's a pen that won't work. And there is no reason to keep it.

Just your daily reminder that if something doesn't work for you, it's okay to get rid of it.

Make room for the joy of a smoothly written line.