Rule No. 1: I don't have to keep gifts

December 21 has come and gone. Somewhere about the 15th I knew that I wasn't going to have time to go through every single thing in my house to assess what is part of the future during the busyness of the holidays.  In lieu of actually doing the manual sort, I made clear commitments to my intentions: what would and would not be part of my future.  Among the commitments I made was to include beliefs, attitudes, and habits.

My day start with an email exchange with an old friend about refusing gifts to avoid the commercialization of Christmas.  I started about 25 years ago by asking friends to give to charity in lieu of giving me gifts.  That didn't fly at all.  Now two and a half decades later, I continue to tell people that I don't need or want "stuff." I would be delighted, I tell them, with the gift of time: a walk, a cup of coffee, cooking together, or a movie and popcorn on the couch after the holidays have passed...or anything else that they'd like to do.  I don't see nearly enough of my friends: spending time with them would be a gift I'd really like to receive...and it doesn't clutter my tiny apartment.

The paper today shared a practice of giving something to charity for everything that we receive.  The example was that if you got a new pair of shoes, you had to give a pair away.  Or, if a child got two toys, he/she had to give two toys away.  If I do keep gifts, I think I will discipline myself to give away in replacement.

Perhaps it is because I've had the accumulation of gifts on my mind that this evening I had an aha! moment when I opened my medicine cabinet which is bulging at the seams.  I surveyed all the stuff in it and realized that I hadn't bought most of it.  Often when I buy cosmetics, I am gifted with a package of generous-sized samples of fairly expensive products.  Some of them I do use, and I am grateful for travel-sized versions of products that I usually purchase for my travel bag.  However, most of the products are not ones I will use.

As I assessed the contents of my cabinet this evening, I started pulling off all the stuff that I know I won't use, didn't want in the first place, and don't want.  Just because someone gives me something doesn't mean I have to keep it.  I haven't taken the time to do so on this eve of Christmas Eve to go through other cabinets and drawers, but I am certain that just following the rule that I don't have to keep gifts will liberate me from a heap of stuff.

Now, I realize that it will be much easier to throw away gifts from Estee Lauder or Clinique than gifts that were given to me by friends, but it isn't like I don't tell them every year that I don't want stuff.  I already spotted homemade food gifts that don't particularly appeal to me.  They will be a good place to start cleaning.

What joy this discovery has made me!  Perhaps this is the gift that I really wanted for Christmas this year: spiritual housecleaning -- freedom to be relieved of the burden of unwanted stuff.