This past weekend, we signed a contract to sell our house. So the packing begins. I've been dreading this time in many ways--the house will look a wreck for the next several weeks, with boxes and stuff we're sorting through all over the place. I hate clutter.
Clutter, however, seems to accumulate in many parts of life--in our houses and in our heads. It's hard to separate what to keep and what to toss in the ideas of life. We come across ideas that we ponder for a time, but we forget about them when other interesting ideas come along; they take up space in our cranial reserves. At some point, we may stumble across that idea, and then we must re-evaluate. Does this idea really have merit? Do I believe in its validity? Why would I think it has validity? Where's the evidence? What does the counter-evidence say? If I think through this idea and come to some conclusion about it, for me its like folding clothes and putting them away--the idea has its place and sits there patiently for me to use it. If I don't resolve these questions, the idea may just get tucked away in my mind as unwanted clutter.
All sorts of things in our lives can create clutter. This picture of my son is a good example. Today I began working on packing away the junk on my desk. I've been going through diskettes, zip disks, and CDs to see what gets packed and what gets tossed. This picture was on a diskette. I don't know when Philip drew this self-portrait. I wonder what he was thinking when he did. Does he remember it? Does he want it? Even if he doesn't want it, I can't throw this one away--it would be like throwing part of him away, and I can't do that.
Some people are comfortable with clutter. I'm not. Clutter keeps us from seeing the significant, the real. Part of my mission in life is to clear cluttered ideas and cluttered things from my life. It's a part of my personality that fuels a great deal of what I do.
