Piles

When I was working I accumulated piles.

No not, hemorrhoids!

Actual piles of ‘to do later’ stuff.

Piles of ‘I can’t deal with that now’ stuff.

And mental piles, virtual to do lists that clog up the brain like sludge.

Come to think of it, they are sort of like hemorrhoids. Ugh.

Piles destroy your quality of life. You cannot live well when you have piles, of any type.

I quite literally had decades of stuff piled up. The actual piles of stuff like paper etc. were annoying to clean up and time consuming but once all was sorted, trashed, cleaned and put away, I could start working on the mental piles.

Things that are stashed away in your mind are the things that make you exhausted and irritable and sometimes crazy. They are unfinished business, and your brain hates unfinished business. It will work 24/7 to solve your problems, to get what you want, to complete your lists whether you are conscious of them or not. This is what your brain is suppose to do; think, solve, plan, organize, be a manager of the rest of you. So mentally file something away and your brain is on it! And no, writing them down does not quiet your brain. It will work even harder on those because they are in writing

The tasks of finishing the unfinished, loving the unloved and the neglected is gut wrenching. From the simple things of sewing a bra strap back on, to finally writing a thank you note (it is never too late for either, your bra and friends understand) I gradually cleared all those mental to do lists out. In the process I discovered many things I’d forgotten about. Embarrassing stuff. Silly stuff. Oh, that would have been great to do stuff.

The great thing about being retired – no matter how short term this may prove to be (money!) is I seemingly have vast expanses of time to do more. Seemingly, because now I really don’t want to do more. I’ve stopped collecting piles, real and imagined and just live for the moment. If something catches my attention, well, if I don’t do it now, I probably will never do it. I will not file it away as a to do later, or sometime if I feel like it.

I am happy to be free of piles for the time being. Life gets so far ahead of you when you are working. Your life belongs to the office and everything else is neglected. So glad those days are OVER.