Spring Cleaning

The tradition of Spring Cleaning has always worked for me, even though I don't carry it to the extremes I've read in novels of earlier times, when women (NEVER men) scoured everything in and out of sight, beat rugs on clotheslines, and thoroughly cleaned every area of their homes (although I have been known to tap my small throw rugs against the front porch railing...). That approach to cleaning has, I trust, gone the way of the dodo bird and the disenfranchisement of women.

 

Nonetheless, there is much to be said for an annual, or semi-annual, tackling of areas in our homes that are not used much and that serve as repositories for 'stuff'. I know the satisfaction I feel when I actually do a proper cleaning on a Saturday - such as last week, when I dusted the living room and dining room and rearranged plants and flowers to gain the most from the beautiful sunshine coming through the (dirty) windows. Imagine the satisfaction to be gained if I were to clean the hall closets and sort through the debris in the catch-all bottom drawer in my office/dressing room or, even more exciting to contemplate, both drawers in my office filing cabinet.

And yet, like many people, I often consider, but do not take, action. I have wondered about that procrastination - in fact, I think it worthy of its own post - I wonder if we get some benefit from not doing something that we know/think we should. Maybe that's the rub - the ubiquitous shoulds in our lives. When I think of spring cleaning - the kind practised, at least in my social group, no more - I think the motivation was more to subscribe to social norms of the day. Now we don't measure our friends' worth by the level of the cleanliness and tidiness of their homes, and if 'keeping up with the Joneses' means spending hours on our hands and knees scrubbing, etc., we opt out.

Having said that, I am about to embark on a Spring Cleaning of one kind: I intend in the next few months to declutter. We are going to be moving out of this house and into something smaller, probably a townhouse, and we have too much 'stuff'. I have moved, way too many times, things that are not useful, needed, beautiful, or remotely interesting. It's time I made a move (pun intended). I have boxes of negatives that have travelled with me since the 70's. I have books that I will never read again (and believe me, books are for me cherished objects) and even some that I have never read....There is sporting equipment for activities that would result in severe physical damage if I were to actually partake of them; there are coats and jackets that I will never wear again....Like many people, I have tended to hang on to things that I don't need and cannot justify paying someone to move, again.

It's time to move towards that zen lightness of living that I so admire. I have decluttered before; this time, I will cut deeper. I truly believe that to rid ourselves of extraneous physical 'stuff' is to rid ourselves of an excess weight of the mind, and I want to be lighter.

Maybe the spring-cleaning women of the 20th century were clearing out internal cobwebs along with the external ones.

I'll see how well I do.

Change of Name and an Explanation

I decided to get rid of my 3rd blog, BeeWriteNow, and change the name of the Bee Diaries to Bee Write Now. Thus there are now posts from January, 2011, published with today's date. I was totally frustrated with the 3rd blog, as I couldn't find a way to set up the template like this one, so I decided to concentrate on this blog to the exclusion of the one that was annoying me. Yay for the power to delete!!

So everything I write from now on will be on this blog; I don't use the BeeFreeThree one at all.

A List of Days

January 1/2

Let's try this again: It's a year later, and I haven't written a thing. Turns out I think more about writing than actually doing it.

I think I had it right last year - 'in order to write something significant, I have to practise with the insignificant'. In fact, I now think I have to let go of the notion of significance completely, as it results in my being too judgemental, which in turn freezes me and results in nothing being written. So what I need to do, instead, is simply list the days; i.e. write about the daily stuff, something every day.

As is often the case, Lynda Monk's writings inspire me. Here are Lynda's writing prompts  from her latest newsletter:

As always, here are your reflective journaling prompts: How will you make your mark this year? How will deeper meaning become part of your lived experience? How will you care for yourself and your health in ways that sustain and nourish you? When you look ahead in your life one year from today, what do you see? Where are you? Who are you with? How do you feel? What’s new? What’s the same? What are you really excited about?

The easiest one for me to tackle refers to self-care and health, because that is what I am concentrating on. While I have some relationship issues that I am not dealing with at the moment, I am working on stopping my bad eating habits and substituting good ones, and I have committed to beginning to exercise regularly again, something that I let slide completely upon my return from my European holiday. I walked lots and lots in France, Italy, and England, then came home and did nothing. So I have walked (minimum of 50 minutes) 4 times in the last 5 days, and I intend to keep that up. As well, I still have a membership card for the local rec centre, so I intend to get back into the exercise program my trainer set up for me last summer - weights and machines and cardio.

I find the idea of thinking about the future a challenging one, especially in a relationship, since being in a relationship means  that one does not have complete control over the future in the sense that where one is a year from now requires input from both parties. I also suspect that many would read the above and say to hell with the relationship, one must do what one must do. I don't agree - I think compromise is part of being in a relationship. However, having said that, I do have a picture, albeit blurry, of this day, next year: I am fit and healthy, which means that I am not pudgy and that I have just finished exercising (probably a walk). I am living with JR in our own townhouse, which has a modern and zen-like feel to it. I am surrounded by visual reminders of the ones I love, and books, and music. I have a glass of cool viognier beside my computer, and I am reading the 330+ posts I have made in this blog. I am very pleased that I have spent 2012 writing, losing weight, increasing my physical fitness level, and learning....

What is this year-from-now Bee excited about? 

 

Bee Write Now

After taking a writing seminar at the end of December, I realized that I need to write, right now, instead of waiting for the big moment when a full novel, or an article on whatever, pops into my head and thence to the page....In order to write something of significance, I have to practise with the insignificant, as it were.

The seminar, led by Lynda Monk (http://creativewellnessworks.com/) was about writing from where you are (literally, as we were scattered about the province, linked by a conference call) in the moment. She facilitated a couple of exercises that got us writing and sharing what we had created - something that we often, even though we might write/journal, don't get to do, especially when feedback is involved.

Really, the point was that whatever we wrote was significant in that it was what we wanted to say at the time of writing. I had to stifle my inner critic, who after hearing a couple of the other women's pieces, was loud and clear in my head that my writing was trivial and uninteresting compared to theirs. I was pleasantly surprised to receive positive feedback from strangers!

Anyway, I have started this blog in order to have a place to engage in writing...as a practice, as therapy, as an outlet, and as a challenge to myself to try to organize my thoughts. A hopeful enterprise for the beginning of a new year.

Posted by Bee at 1:10 PM