“Attachment to the past and fears concerning the future not only govern the way you select the things you own but also represent the criteria by which you make choices in every aspect of your life, including your relationships with people and your job.”

~ Marie Kondo

For me, the very first day of the year’s last month starts on the highest note. I have seen quite a few 1st of Decembers in my life, right since the first day. Quite literally. Along with the excess excitement, today I feel a sense of gloom loom over my head. The gone year has seen the best as well as the worst of me, and I can feel a stark contrast between what I was exactly a year ago. I have a really long list of things that have happened, and excuse me while I disclose a few spoilers. I am not married (yet). Haven’t managed to become a millionaire (yet). And well, above all, I have not managed to be size zero (yet).

So, now that the major three concerns of any woman’s life are addressed, I have way too many amazing things to share. Endless manifestation experiences, every day synchronicity, and a lot of woo woo stuff. But, above all, I feel such strong conviction towards this world going in a beautiful direction. With all the madness the media publishes, there is a secret, subtle yet magnificent world underneath that is coming to power. I feel a part of it. Believe it or not, there is a lot more kindness and compassion doing rounds, than what you’re made to believe. While shopping was in vogue, downsizing of belongings is the new thing. Distancing from people and places that do not help our higher purpose. People are encouraged to have kitchen gardens. Eat cleaner. Un-schooling their children. And a huge lot of people turning to Yoga and Meditation. Oh did I mention, a good number of people turning vegetarian if not vegan?

We are learning to experience happiness like never before, and being in the moment is something we are being taught by many great masters, through their lives. People are on the pursuit of enlightenment and finding their purpose. Path-breaking innovations. Choosing dynamic and diverse careers. Walking the path less travelled. Chasing joy, like a child runs after a colourful butterfly! So yeah, the world is pretty much turning hippy I reckon!

If I ask you to stop here, look around and seek three things that you are grateful for? Things that continue to bring warmth, while it continues to snow outside? As good as we are programmed to hunt for the faults and the defects, I feel a lot more efforts need to be put into observing the joys. But oftentimes, we fail to seek them, for imperfections are omnipresent.

I confess being a hoarder all my life. Until recently, I found my grip over things starting to loosen, as the voids within me started to fill up with joy. The delicate balance that has been ongoing is a dance I myself am enjoying, as a performer, as a spectator.

It all started on last New Year Eve, when I felt a sudden pang in my heart. I felt clueless, aimless and joyless. Yet again. Something demanded a massive change, after putting about two decades of work into self-improvement, something still seemed amiss. I repeated the above exercise, of looking around and spotting three things I felt joyful, grateful for. I found none. Instead, I found piles of unmade decisions. A rack full of unread books. About a few hundred of them. Unsent letters. A pile of new, yet unused clothes I felt guilty of buying, and had decided to donate. A beautiful piece of art, and my Yoga TTC photo gathering dust. As I opened my accessories drawer, I found a pair of my favourite earrings, I never quite found the perfect occasion to adorn with. And at other places, I found failed promises scattered all around me, that I was supposed to keep.

Like every year, I set up a resolution for the new year, and for the first time in all these years, I kept the promise. It is already December, you kidding me?!

I started with skimming my Facebook friend list from a constant 5k, down to 1.5k or so. I could feel a childlike joy, having given the permission to the self, to let go off the obligations to remain friends with certain people, and I gleefully unfriended (or block in some cases) people who drained the vital energy out of me. It was finally time for them to leave. Mid November, I decided to deactivate Facebook for good two weeks. Well, I’m now guilty of hoping you finding this article somewhere on Facebook.

I can’t exactly remember how it happened, but I landed on a YouTube video of a tidying expert Marie Kondo, with her bestselling book and tidying method, the KonMari Method. Something struck a chord. Didn’t I talk of synchronicities? I binge watched a few more videos, and ordered her book right away. I read the entire book in one sitting!

“The process of facing and selecting our possessions can be quite painful. It forces us to confront our imperfections and inadequacies and the foolish choices we made in the past.”

~ Marie Kondo

While I followed her method, I could not believe the anxiety it brought along with it. I felt sick looking at the sheer volume of stuff that belonged to me. Each one bringing one awful memory after another. I realised how unhappy my clothes, or certain items made me feel. Well, most of them did. KonMari talks of only retaining things that ‘Spark Joy’. Within a day’s time, my wardrobe went to 1/5th its size. I felt such immense relief to finally let go off the clothes I dearly disliked wearing, yet I kept, for I had spent unbelievable amount of money on them. My clothes shopping trends have not been quite impressive really. Each piece of clothing was a constant reminder of a rather foolish choice. It also made me realise, how my taste in almost everything has changed over time, yet I kept adding, without letting my hold off the old stuff. May it be clothes, books, old diaries, stationery, travel souvenirs, hundreds of postcards collected in the due course of my travels or my fondest possessions, handwritten letters. You just name it.

I found my kindergarten school uniform. A pile of identity cards of various places. Awful school report cards, that were a reminder of how much I disliked going to school. Letters from many toxic friends. I even found inter-school chess score sheets (surprisingly haven’t found the entire game written, yet), romance I had long forgotten. My pencil sketches. Jewellery making sets. Japanese origami papers. Stationery that could actually fill up an entire shop. Well, my room seemed to house many lives, quite an obvious reflection of mine. One can’t possible make out, if an architect lived here, or a Yogini. A writer or a Life Coach? An artist, or a antique collector? A manifestation machine, manifesting nothing but piles of procrastination!

I would be lying, if I’d say I had the situation under control. In fact, far from it. I cried my eyes out a few times. I felt overwhelmed and miserable. Maybe even as I write, for some decisions have been way too hard to make. How does one let go of beautiful things, when you were rather thrilled to buy, yet they never made their way into my life? How do I let go of the petite black dress, that was saved for the day I finally hit the size zero mark? Or the empty diaries, that were to hold the ever pending book I had promised to start writing? I can feel the burden of so many dreams I have failed to achieve by the time I turn 30. We love pressurising ourselves, don’t we?

It may sound rather absurd, but if my room doesn’t really have a room for my own life, how would my life have a room for another person? If my room didn’t have room for the most exquisite artefacts that I own, how will my life hold million dollars? How would I shed the excess weight, if I felt burdened by the weight I carried around in the form of things in my room? I dozed off agitated that night, and woke up in the middle of night, having figured out the answer in my dreams. Oh did I forget to mention, that I often solve problems in my sleep?

An answer popped up. Energy residues! I had old energy looming around in my beautiful room, which has been holding me back from becoming the best version of myself. I was literally jumping around in the middle of night, at 02:30 am. I could hardly contain my excitement, and had to share this eureka moment with a loved one. I lay awake for a good hour that night, contemplating on different things that I had to let go of. I wanted to make room for the joy filled beautiful things that I already had. Joy patiently had been awaiting at my doorsteps, for me to find this moment of bulb lighting up my dim lit room of mind. But now, I felt as if flood lights were put on, and I could see every nook and corner of my life, not just the room! Everything became crystal clear. As if I had perfect pilot vision. As if a mist that was lifted, by the rising sun.

The next morning, I woke up with immense gratitude for all that I have, and had ever possessed in past. It dawned upon me, quite literally, how the ‘clutter’ in my room, was in fact abundance surrounding me. I felt a wave of calm wash over me, and the same room, with (ahem) the stuff lying around, made me feel way different from the previous evening. I had a sudden surge of happiness within me, and somehow felt it rather liberating to part with seemingly precious items.

While the weather grows colder, I feel a sense of warmth fill up the crevices within me. A broken vase, put together with gold. Like the wabi-sabi ideology in Japan, which focuses on accepting things, including people with all their imperfections, including ours. I realise how beautiful my faults can also be, for they make me, Me. If I can love myself with all my imperfections, how difficult could it be to love anyone else? Letting go of the rigid expectations, yet aiming for excellence feels like a blissful dissatisfaction, as someone rightly quoted.

Like, on the New Year Eve, when I sit in my favourite corner, curled up in my favourite blanket, holding my favourite tall mug, full of my favourite ginger tea; I contemplate over the things I have accomplished in the bygone year and the dreams I have for the one dawning. A beautiful thought crossed my mind, what if my beloved child ever breaks one of these delicate items that have been my priced possessions? How would I react? I’d probably choose to respond, by letting it go, and hold close my baby. For, I know who is more valuable. So what is it, that holds me back now, when that piece is still intact, when someone else can still use it? After it has already served me with the thrill and joy, how beautifully can I be able to let it go with love, grace and gratitude?!

“Have gratitude for the things you’re discarding. By giving gratitude, you’re giving closure to the relationship with that object, and by doing so, it becomes a lot easier to let go.”

~ Marie Kondo