MIND HOARDERS

I encountered this ‘ESTATE SALE’ on my morning walk. It was all unusable junk: lice-laden sofas, broken chairs, rusted weights from ancient barbells, cheap, bent silverware and clothes so stained and dog-haired, I’d be embarrassed to put them on a hangar. The nicest item was the white tent, which at first I mistook for a crime scene. Who keeps this garbage and why was there a line of people waiting to buy it?

As a therapist, I’m well aware of the stuff people hang onto in their heads. Sometimes, I wish I could stick the end of a vacuum into a client’s ear and suck out the junk they’ve stored in there. If only it were that easy. Many are reluctant to relinquish the thoughts that have sustained and defined them thus far. Some wear their diagnoses like badges of honor but often, they’re simply excuses.

Insurance companies are crazy mad for diagnoses but I hate doing them. At best they’re a guess. Despite what the DSM-V says, ALL of us are on the spectrum of something. I’m narcissistic, a bit autistic, fairly OCD and very ADHD but so what? It just makes me weird and interesting. Considering that we only show parts of ourselves to others, how good is a ‘partial’ diagnosis anyway? About as helpful as analyzing dark matter I figure.

Decluttering a house is easy but clearing out the mind is much trickier. Once you let negative or contradictory thoughts hold you hostage, you become their prisoner. Further, if you have any unfinished business, be it with finances or friends, your brain fixes on it subconsciously until it’s completed. It’s called the Zeigarnick effect and can actually keep you up at night. It’s the sole reason I pay a bill the day I get it.

Recently I took a 3-month rental and spent the first several hours removing tchotchkes, knick-knacks and dust-laden, artificial plants (there were seven)— which I stuck in a laundry basket. I added the dirty area rug and a broken chair and asked the landlord to cart it all off.

“You sure you don’t want these,” he asked scratching his head.

“Positive.”

I simply cannot think straight in chaos and clutter. According to science, neither can you. So, purchase one of these and call me in the morning. 🙂

P. S. I just finished “In My Skin,” by British author, Kate Holden. Reading this may make you queasy. It’s a visceral portrait of her life as a heroin addict and sex worker; a job, in which she took a rather surprising and immense sense of pride in.

What I’m reading now: “Endurance” by Alfred Lansing about British explorer Edward Shackleton’s 1914 quest to reach Antarctica. He had the strongest ship ever built at the time, crafted by a Norwegian company. However, it was no match for the glacier of ice which pressed in on him from all sides at the start of Chapter Four.

Yesterday, England prevailed over Norway in the World Cup! I rooted for both as my daughter is now living in England and my grandfather was from Oslo.