It is so easy to say “Just let it go”.  It really is an easy concept, but so much more difficult to apply.   We get into these patterns of collecting things, collecting emotions, collecting feelings, collecting hurt, collecting grudges, collecting bitterness, collecting fear.  But the results we really want are the opposite of all those things.  We’d much rather collect love, collect peacefulness, collect harmony, and collect happiness.  These are the things that can fulfill us and sustain us through life.  And yet we don’t do it.

On January 15, 2017 I decided that I had enough of collecting everything except what was truly brining me happiness.  And so I started what I call “31 Days of Letting Go”.  I said to Christine, “why can’t I just let go of things. I’m going to start with 30 days of letting go and get rid of something every day”. Then I realized that making it 31 days would land on Valentine’s Day, my mom’s birthday, and the one-year anniversary of asking her to be my girlfriend.  I couldn’t think of a better inspiration, and started on my quest. I was scared. I was excited. I asked her “Do I even have 31 things to get rid of?”.  She laughed with that “seriously???” type of thing. That question is kind of silly, really, because I have hundreds of things I could get rid it.  It was just too fearful to think at that time staring on a journey where I might not be successful at; and thinking I would have to let go of things that have been providing “comfort” for so long.

Why is it so fearful to let go of things? Why is it so fearful of letting go of that which holds us back; that which doesn’t bring happiness; that which fills our space with unessentials; that which weighs on us; that which steals us of peacefulness; that which makes us feel empty, even though we have so much?

I asked myself what would I do if I only was able  to keep 50 or 100 things to keep.  Well what would I do? What would you do? I have thousands of items, both physically and emotionally.  What am I achieving by containing all these things instead of setting them (me) free?  If I want to be more of a minimalist (that’s an oxymoron right there) how do I expect to achieve this by having a maximum collection mindset?

That’s what this big challenge to myself is.  Every day I have let go of something.  That something could be a physical object that wasn’t really adding value to anything in my life — it was actually just cluttering up other value I have.  It also could have been something emotional that I was, for some unknown reason, attached to.  Or it could have been a habit that I was repeating (some of which had lasted 25 + years), that I honestly cannot give myself a good reason why I was continuing.  It is sad that something I started so long ago for some reason or another and kept repeating just because of the longevity of doing, long had outlived its purpose or usefulness.  And when you cannot remember or find the usefulness in something that you have been repeating for such a large portion of your life, you gotta ask your: Why the F*** am I continuing to do this.  And when you have no good value, reason, logic, purpose, identity with, joy or fulfillment from….well, you release your grip on it, give it an emotional hug, and you let it go.  Now 26 days later I have begun letting go of things that that do not bring me any ounces of joy….

-Joe Tesoro, Jr 2/10/17