life

Have you ever gotten the urge to purge things from your life…people, things that no longer bring you joy or have just been sitting in a closet collecting dust?

The past few weeks I have done just that and honestly it is still a work in progress. I went through so many things…all while taking a trip down memory lane. You would be surprised the stuff you come across when you finally start going through it.

Many items just went to the garbage; others were donated to those that could put it to good use.

I found old poetry that I had written back when I was in my early twenties…man I was full of angst back then. I came across an old Newspaper from an Nsync concert that I attended in 2001; I kept that.

Anyone else have a collection of Birthday Cards? I had so many cards that had been collected over the years. They had come from family, old coworkers, old friends. I kept the ones that still had meaning and got rid of the rest. It is not to say that those cards that were disposed of didn’t hold meaning at one time, it just means that they don’t hold meaning currently and it seemed silly to continue to hold on to them when that was not going to change.

There were CDs and DVDs. I can’t remember the last time I popped a Cd in; cars don’t even come with cd players anymore. On top of DVDs, when nowadays you can just stream everything and own a digital copy if you want to purchase. All of these items just taken up precious space.

It was cathartic to let stuff go, in a way freeing. Freeing myself from things that no longer held space in my life and opening it up to things that truly bring me joy.

Can you pinpoint that moment in time, when you realized that your dreams were never going to come to fruition? I can….it’s a moment that I can’t seem to let go of.

Growing up I always struggled with self-esteem issues. It didn’t help the hurtful words thrown at me, telling me I was ugly, being fluffed off as boys being boys.

In middle school we did this project call Voyage of the Mimi, I loved it minus the dissecting an animal part. During that project, I had made up my mind that I wanted to become a Marine Biologist, move to Florida and work at SeaWorld. I was so excited and told someone, I am going to let that person remain anonymous. Their response still echoing in my mind, they couldn’t see me working with people let alone animals. I was crushed. What I heard in that moment was that I wasn’t good enough and that I would never be good enough. And I have struggled ever since.

Words carry a lot of weight and power…to some degree I understand that I have the power to let it go, but for whatever reason, I can’t.

I have had other dreams over the years, wanting to become a Writer and still do, but no matter if people tell me I am good enough, I don’t feel it. I feel all these years that my life has been stuck in park, while others got to go out and live theirs.

When will it be my turn? When do I get to feel like I accomplished something? When will I feel good enough, pretty enough, or worthy enough? Because right now, I feel none of those things. I feel as though all those BIG dreams that I dreamed, are just that dreams, lost in dreamland.