My mom worked full-time as a public school teacher from the second she earned her bachelor’s degree until the second she retired. Even now, in retirement, she still substitute teaches quite a bit.

Growing up, never once did I hear my mom complain about her job.

Never once did I hear my mom long for an alternate life where she didn’t have to work as much.

Never once did I hear my mom wish she could be a stay at home mom.

Never once did I hear my mom question her purpose in life.

She just did what she needed to do. She did what she loved. She made it all work. She worked full-time, cared for three children, tended the household, supported my dad who worked two jobs (full-time teaching and part-time car sales), made delicious homemade meals, kept beautiful flower pots, sewed and mended things as needed, hosted a garage sale every year, and so on.

Between mothering, teaching, cooking and tending house, my mom was in her glory. She seriously DID. IT. ALL. (Although note I didn’t give her any credit for awesome self-care practices along the way. Mom, you know we always want you to do more for yourself.)

Before I became a mother, I assumed I would follow in my mom’s footsteps. I assumed I’d be 100% ALL IN for the balanced lifestyle of full-time work and full-time motherhood.

Yeah, before becoming a mother, I knew so much about balancing work and motherhood, that for years, I silently criticized moms who had college degrees, but chose to stay home full-time with their kids and “do nothing with their lives.” To put it more bluntly, if a mom had a college degree and she wasn’t actively using it towards gainful paid employment, I thought she wasting her degree, wasting her life away. Yep. What a waste.

Man, do I need to EAT my silent, unspoken words now.

Please forgive me, moms.

Please forgive me, college-educated moms who aren’t employed full-time in the workplace.

Please forgive me for criticizing you when I had no clue.

Please forgive me for placing judgement on you when I had no experience.

Please forgive me for assuming such harsh things about your life and your decision-making capabilities.

Please forgive me for being so narrow minded that I couldn’t understand why a woman would have gotten a college degree in the first place if “all she was going to do” was stay home with her kids.

Yeah, I had no clue. 

By the time I returned from maternity leave after our first child was born, I knew this full-time working and full-time mothering gig wasn’t going to work for me. Nevertheless, I survived 1 1/2 years of full-time employment as a mom because the truth was, at that time, we couldn’t afford to have me stay home in any capacity.

Approximately 18 months into motherhood, my husband got enough of a raise that allowed me to stay home one day a week. I applied for a part-time leave, and by the time our son was 22 months old, I was working four days a week. Life felt much more comfortable.

Things shifted again when our second child came along.

And when our third child arrived nearly seven years after that, things shifted yet again.

There’s only one thing I know for sure after 12 1/2 years of mothering. I have NO. IDEA. HOW. TO BALANCE. WORK AND MOTHERHOOD.

It’s clear, okay?

I have no idea how to do this.

The proof is in the pudding.

As of 2015, I’ve DONE. IT. ALL. as far as work-motherhood balance.

I’ve worked 5 days a week. 4 days a week. 3 days a week. 2 days a week. 1 day a week. And now, in 2015, for the first time ever in my mothering career, I’m home full-time.

Yes, I’ve become the woman I silently criticized.

I have a bachelor’s degree. I have a master’s degree. And I’m staying home full-time.

Writing this truth makes me feel kind of icky. You know? The kind of icky like I had to eat all those ugly thoughts and words I kept to myself about college-educated stay-at-home moms all those years. Icky like I should be working today, bringing in some income for our family other than just sitting here typing away on a blog, hoping and praying for a writing career that will actually pay something someday. Icky like I have NO IDEA how to strike the magnificent work-motherhood balance that almost everyone else seems to have found?! Icky like this is NOT the balance my mom struck. Icky like this is NOT the balance my neighbor struck. Icky like this is not the balance my husband’s female corporate colleagues struck. Icky like this is NOT the balance I envisioned for myself.

We’re modern women, they say, pioneers of a whole new generation. We’ll make our own way. We’ll establish our own place at home and in the workplace. We’ll land somewhere comfortably between the old-fashioned housewife who was expected to stay home and abandon her own self-fulfillment and actualization, and the feminist who burned her bra, abandoned all traditional notions of motherhood, embraced equal opportunity employment and fought hard against the so-called glass ceiling. Yes, they say we modern women can “Do It All In Our Lifetime.”

But I have to ask. Have we found a comfortable resting place between old-fashioned housewivery and and feminism? I, for one, am sometimes still confused, lacking clarity as to my place. Clearly, I haven’t quite figured it out. Clearly, I’m a pioneer, often left wondering and wandering in the sea of questions, insecurities and uncertainties about how work and motherhood fit together.

I rationalize.

I’ll become a “better mom.” I’ll have all of this worked out when the kids are older, when they’re in high school and college. Maybe I’m just not good at figuring this all out when they’re still little.

I justify.

I know in my heart that this is a season, a very short time in life when I have the opportunity to be home full-time with the kids, that years from now I’ll be SO glad I had this opportunity. And I know with all my heart that this is TRUE. But right now, there’s still a part of me that feels like I’m wasting my college degree, like I’m wasting my potential at home…tending a house, caring for children full-time, wiping counters, wiping butts, writing for no pay, and doing all the most ordinary, mundane things of life like cleaning toilets and packing cold lunches.

Then, I accept the truth.

I’m a mom. I have a master’s degree. I worked for 14 1/2 years. Now I’m not working at all. My work life has been all over the board. And I don’t claim to have any balance.

It is what it is.

Okay?!

I don’t have any balance.

I have no clue how to achieve work-motherhood balance.

I don’t get it.

And that’s okay.

I don’t claim to have mastered anything about this parenting or mothering gig, so why would I expect myself to have mastered the elusive work-motherhood balance either?

As I stood quietly by the monkey bars at the park this past weekend, I accepted the fact that this is my life, my one true life. I have three kids. My husband has a corporate job. He’s magnificent at what he does. I’m blessed to have this once-in-a-lifetime, very short-term, seasonal opportunity to stay at home full-time while these kids are still young. Before I know it, they’ll be all grown up. I’ll long for these days, I’ll miss these days when the kids are still small, when they’re all still at home. So I will embrace this life, even if it feels a little mundane at times. I will embrace this life, even if I have to remind myself 500 times that my contribution to the human race is just as worthy inside the home as it is outside of the home. 

I looked down at my jeans and Sketchers against the playground wood chips, and let the reality wash over me. Yes, this is a far cry from my favorite White House Black Market work clothes that fill the closet. But this is my life. This is a good life, too.

The kids fight over swings. They twist swings. They taunt and tease one another. They don’t go up the slide the right way, and do all kinds of potentially dangerous things. The honest truth is, we’re all a bit edgy because daddy had a ridiculously busy week and was gone six out of seven days. And yeah, we’re going out for dinner because I can’t handle more meal preparation at this point.

But hey.

Life is good.

We’re going to walk home from this park.

We’re going to enjoy pizza buffet together when daddy gets home.

We’re going to do this again tomorrow.

And it will be good and grace-filled all over again.

The kids don’t have a clue about work-motherhood-fatherhood balance yet. Neither do I.

Perhaps my work-motherhood IMBALANCE will prove to be a blessing someday.

Perhaps someday my children will reflect on their upbringing and realize it’s okay to not have everything perfectly together all the time. Life isn’t always about mastering things and getting everything JUST RIGHT.

Perhaps someday my daughters will come to me when they’re confused about this working and mothering balance, and I’ll be able to tell them with all honesty…been there, done that, sweetheart. Here’s how I worked through it. Day by day. Year by year. Child by child. Follow your heart, sweet one. There’s never one best answer.

Perhaps someday when my husband’s ready to retire and I’m still working like a mad woman in all the unconventional ways, he’ll realize I meant what I said. I’m not saying I don’t want to work, I’m saying for right now, my work is at HOME.

Perhaps someday when the children are grown and we have grandchildren running in the yard, I’ll look back with peace, resting confident in the knowledge that my degrees were never, ever wasted. In that moment, all the pieces of my life put together will make perfect sense. And I’ll whisper to the mamas from the mountaintops, forget about the magical work-motherhood balance. Just forget about it mamas. You’re doing great right where you are.

 

A couple weeks ago, I shared that I’ve begun the lengthy process of cleaning out and cleaning up our entire house, top to bottom. One of you asked if I would please continue to share updates as I moved through the house. So here I am. In the kitchen today.

When I shared the last blog post about clutter, one of the areas I’d recently cleaned out was the kitchen island. It seemed like a small thing at the time. After all, the island only accounts for a tiny piece of our kitchen. (And just to be clear, the island doesn’t look much different than it did before the clean out. But hey, I know it’s been done and I feel better, so doesn’t that count for something?)

At any rate, I knew today was going to be another clean out day. I didn’t have anything planned outside of the house until early evening, so I had time to dedicate to a big project. It was time to get back to the kitchen.

I began on the far side of the kitchen, the side closest to the living room. I figured that way, it would be easiest to keep track of where I’d been, as well as where I’d left off for the next round of cleaning out and cleaning up. That brought me to the refrigerator and cupboard above it.

I started up top with the dusty cabinet near the ceiling. I wiped the cupboard door fronts well, and was quite surprised at how dirty they were. Then I opened them to discover all the things that are way up high, on top of our fridge, for good reason. Bottles of alcohol. A swath of glass vases. Random things we very rarely use, including an ice cream maker, an old-fashioned coffee pot, the turkey roaster, and a leather wine pouch for all the romantic opportunities we have to picnic together with wine.

I found an old bottle of alcohol in the back that had never been opened. Did my husband even realize it was there? I moved it to the front.

I combined two bottles of Two Gingers Irish Whiskey, a task I asked my husband to do last weekend when the screw top on one of the bottles was stripped. He told me we didn’t have another bottle of Two Gingers. Today, I was glad to discover we did have two bottles. I married the two and promptly recycled the stripped bottle.

I considered getting rid of the leather wine pouch, but decided who knows, maybe someday we’ll have another opportunity to picnic in the park with wine.

Then came the inevitable. All those glass vases. There was one big, butt ugly golden vase that had to go. No doubt about that. I wasn’t even sure why I kept it all this time anyway. Then all the others. I’m not even kidding you, we had about 25 glass vases. I inspected them all. I looked at all the different styles. I imagined how I’d pair them beautifully on tables when we hosted holiday meals. I imagined how I might need them someday if I host a fundraiser and want to line tables with flower vases. I imagined summertime, where I’d bring in beauties from the garden and arrange them in Mason-style vases. Sure. It was possible that any of those imaginings could and would be realities. But how many glass vases do we really need? How many pairings of vases can we actually use for our little family of five?

So I got rid of several vases. The ugly gold one had to go, of course. After that, it was just pick one, pick another, pick another, and so on. For the most part, I realized I really didn’t care. Vases are vases. There was nothing particularly spectacular about any of them.

I washed them up so I would feel better about donating them to the thrift store. (They were quite dusty, after all.) Then I got out a box and started loading everything in.

That led me to realize that I needed to just go ahead and fill up that box with as much stuff as I could. It was all going to the thrift store. Today. I was determined to fill that box as quickly as I could. So I moved a few cupboards over to the massive space I was so excited about when we moved into the house. The massive cupboard space that’s now full for the most part, full of a lot of stuff we don’t use that much. Within minutes, I cleaned out several water bottles that I hate to use or wash, some random glasses, four or five cheap plastic kids placemats, and other random junk. Okay, junk isn’t the best description at all. It was actually good stuff, decent stuff. I just didn’t have any attachment to it. I didn’t see any reason to keep any of it. In one swoop, I’d filled an entire box.

When the box was filled, I took this picture and just stared at all the items that filled it.

I didn’t care about one single thing in that box. Not one single thing. It meant nothing to me. Nothing was useful to me. Nothing was beautiful to me. Nothing was sentimental to me. Nothing.

I wondered. Why do we keep things we don’t need? What is the benefit? What is the point of having things around that we don’t need OR use? All these excess things do is clutter our minds, our hearts, our souls to the point where we can’t breathe anymore, to the point where we can’t think anymore, to the point where we can’t just BE anymore.

I’ve had enough.

Getting rid of the box of junk (a.k.a. good stuff, just fine stuff) I never use.

There’s no use keeping stuff I don’t need.

There’s no use keeping stuff I don’t use.

It’s cluttered my life long enough.

Good bye.

I promptly plopped the box in the front seat of my SUV, loaded my baby girl in her car seat, and told her we were going to the thrift store. When we got there, I picked up the box, walked in briskly, sat the box down on the donations table, walked towards my car, and didn’t look back one second.

Good bye.

Good riddance.

There’s no use keeping stuff I don’t need.

Why?

 

 

 

 

I’m pretty sure I’m in the midst of a major life transition. Call it a mid-life crisis if you wish. I prefer to call it a mid-life awakening.

Questions accompany awakenings. Big questions. Deep questions. Important questions. Hard questions.

If we want to change course, if we want to turn our back to old ways and pursue new ways, if we want to trust that what’s ahead of us is better than what’s behind us, we must ask the big, deep, important and hard questions of life.

I’m not an advocate of excessive complaining, lamenting and questioning, but I do believe that no matter how optimistic we are, no matter how upbeat we are, no matter how faith-filled we are, no matter how great our life may be, real life still happens. It’s undeniable, right?

We wonder. We ask. We want to know.

Why? What? Where?

When? How? Who?

So I’m asking the hard questions today. Because I want to. Because I need to. Because maybe you’re asking them too. Because maybe we need sit in the questions, be humbled, and realize we’re not God. We don’t know everything. We can’t fix everything. We don’t understand everything. We’re human, after all.

So let’s get to it.

I’m asking all the hard questions.

I’m just asking…

What is the point, God?

Why is there winter?

Why is it so cold sometimes I can barely breathe?

Why do people starve to death?

Why is there such disparity between the poor and the wealthy?

Why are children the victims of sexual assault?

Why do people have to suffer with autism, dementia, Alzheimers, severe cerebral palsy, deafness, blindness, severe mental illness and the like?

Why do people lie lifeless in comas?

Why do people live lifeless lives of oblivion?

Why do young men and women pass away long before their time?

Why do babies get life-threatening diseases? Why should a baby ever suffer to the point of death? What is the point, God?

Why do we love money so much?

Why don’t we want to help each other more?

Why are we so self-centered?

Why do we fight so much?

Why do we worry about stupid, pointless things?

Why do women think so little of themselves that they prostitute themselves?

Why in the world do people think it’s okay to expose themselves repeatedly to pornography?

Why in the world do they think that is sexy?

Why are near-naked women on magazine covers so often, but not nearly as many near-naked men?

Why are marriages going down the tubes?

Why do kids say mean things to each other?

Why don’t we have more friends?

Why do we live so isolated?

Why do we think bigger is better?

Why do we clutter our homes with stuff, stuff and more stuff?

Why do elderly have to revert to wearing Depends at the end of a good, long life?

Why don’t we value the elderly more in our culture?

Why are innocent people being beheaded?

Why do people talk behind each others’ backs?

Why don’t we love each other more?

Why are we scared of other people?

Why are we scared of being intimate with others?

Why do we so desperately long for more of everything and anything?

Why is there a void?

Why?

Why are we hurting?

Why are we totally disconnected from reality?

Why do we continue to think we’ll magically discover healing and transforming words, photographs, and videos on Facebook?

Why do people overanalyze what others say on Facebook all the time?

Why do we only want to hear the good stuff, the fun stuff, the light-hearted stuff?

Why don’t we talk about hard stuff more?

Why do we blame one another for stupid stuff?

Why can’t we all just get along?

Why are we arguing about the definition of marriage?

Why has it been nearly four months since I’ve gone on a date with my husband?

Why does work have to be so stressful?

Why does unpaid work NOT count for anything in our culture?

Why do I have 10 awesome dresses in my closet and nowhere to wear them?

Why did I get coerced into buying a belt that I’ve never worn?

Why can’t we seem to dig out of our messes?

Why did my neighbors have to get divorced and move?

Why have I seemed to have lost complete touch with an old friend?

Why aren’t woman supporting each other more?

Why does helping have to hurt?

Why are there smiling faces of children living in extreme poverty on my cupboard door?

Why does life have to be so hard that a senior’s daddy can’t attend her high school graduation party?

Why do people lie in bed all day?

Why do people hide away in their houses?

Why are people afraid of everything?

Why is extroversion so highly valued in our culture?

Why can’t our kids go outside and play without us being worried all the time?

Why do the experts make us feel guilty, as if we’re doing something wrong as parents all the time?

Why are stay at home moms undervalued?

Why did the mommy wars start in the first place?

Why do we have to “do it all?”

Why do I own several table books and never look at any of them?

Why do our kids need so many toys?

Why do our kids need toys at all?

Why do some kids go without any toys at all?

Why?

Why do we fight about stupid stuff?

Why do some people get pregnant like that, while others can’t get pregnant at all?

Why are there orphans?

Why do children have to live through trauma?

Why do we meet and love people, and then never see them again?

Why do people play games with our minds?

Why don’t people believe in God?

Why does church have to be so political sometimes?

Why do we allow kids sporting tournaments to run on Sundays?

Why do kids have to specialize in a sport by 4th, 5th or 6th grade?

Why do we have to label people?

Why can’t we all just recognize that we have different personalities?

Why wasn’t I there the day a friend had an abortion?

Why wasn’t I there when friends were going through divorces?

Why do people have affairs?

Why do people look for happiness in complete strangers?

Why don’t people just commit and get married after 10 years of dating?

Why don’t we see extended family more often?

Why don’t we take care of ourselves?

Why does life have to be so fast-paced?

Why are we jealous of one another?

Why don’t we support each other more in our passions and pursuits?

Why do we keep our dreams to ourselves?

Why don’t I have lunch with you more often?

Why did we fall away from one another?

Why does it cost so much for competitive kids’ dance?

Why do I have a huge house and others don’t have one at all?

Why do I feel guilty when I buy regular eggs, milk, meat and produce instead of organic?

Why does everything have to be evil?

Why does everything seem to require money?

Why is life so complicated?

Why do we live so isolated?

Why are we confused?

Why are we lonely?

Why are we stressed?

Why does life feel like it’s always in some sort of disarray?

Why?

Why don’t we have more peace?

Why don’t we have more faith?

Why don’t we share more love?

Why don’t we care more deeply?

Why don’t we invite each other in?

Why don’t we connect?

Why compare?

Why don’t we just ask for help?

Why don’t we just ask for what we need?

Why don’t we just ask for a minute to breathe, for a minute to catch up to this crazy life?

Why don’t we just gather?

Why don’t we just sit in community and ponder all the questions?

Why?

 

 

I stood alone, staring at a display of brightly-painted clay women in that Dominican Republic market. Who knew I’d find myself here? Now. For such a time as this.

Moments earlier, I’d been giddy over a painted canvas I’d purchased from the upper level of hidden gems nobody seemed to have found. But joy eventually subsided, and I found myself drawn to the front of the store, to a dusty row of clay women.

I picked up the figurines, one by one, analyzing for beauty, for message, for heart and soul. Each was unique. Their colors, postures, heights and weights told stories of who the artist thought they might be. Some held flowers, some held clutches, some held bellies, and some stood pristine. Some were royal. Some were plain. All were dusty. And I wondered. When did someone last ponder the purposes of these beauties?

Our minutes in the store were numbered. I was bound and determined to find a figure that matched the state of my soul. Truth be told, I wasn’t sure what I was looking for. I just knew I’d know her when I found her.

After a while of looking, my heart panicked a bit. They were all so beautiful and many would suffice. But the one was yet to be found.

My fingers were dusty, dirty in fact. The figures weren’t in pristine pretty rows anymore. Dusty glass marked the places they once stood. I kept my favorites to the front, but kept reaching back, further back.

There she was.

Golden. With white and red accents. And long brown hair.

She was clutching her belly just like the figurine I purchased in Haiti and adore on my dresser every morning before I wake. There was something contemplative, ready to be birthed in her.

She was the one.

From the moment I picked her up, I noticed her imperfections. Her dress was chipped at the bottom. Her long brown hair revealed hard clay beneath.

I decided I’d take her anyway. After all, if there was one thing I’d learned, it was that perfection wasn’t getting me anywhere. I might as well take her, imperfections and all. She was beautiful, even so.

$8. A bargain, I thought, for such beauty.

They wrapped her up and our group parted the market within moments. I carried her around the rest of the day, then back to the hotel by my suitcase for our last night in the Dominican.

In the morning, I began packing. I’d carefully set aside miss beauty until the end. I wanted to reserve a specially-padded place for her in my suitcase, or maybe in my carry-on. She was wrapped quite well, but still.

I’d packed nearly everything. She was last to go except a few strays for my purse.

I stepped back, and crunch. I’d broken miss beauty in two.

Apparently, she was too fragile to withstand the blow. I lifted her up, opened the bag and unwrapped her goodness from layers of tissue paper. When I stepped back, I’d literally broken off her head. She’d lost her head. On my account.

I laughed. Yes, I was a little heart broken. But I laughed anyway.

What else could I do?

This beauty I spent 20 minutes selecting the afternoon prior had lost her head already!

Was it a complete waste, or maybe meant to be?

I told my roommate about the accident, and packed that clay beauty right back up in her tissue. I’m quite sure others would have tossed her straight into the trash. After all, she was only worth $8 with her head on! But something told me she was meant to go home just like that. Broken. With her head off once and for all.

You see, I’d been broken that week. I’d completely lost it on that trip. The dream I’d had for four, nearly five years – to write on behalf of children living in extreme poverty, FOR Compassion International – had come true. But my husband had just been diagnosed with eye cancer. And whether I wanted to admit it or not, life was going to be impacted. The trip was going to be impacted. Yes, I’d lost it. I’d lost my head. All the plans, all the purposes I’d ever envisioned, all the ways I’d write every day and everything would flow perfectly just like it had in Haiti? Well, it didn’t happen quite like I envisioned. God, in fact, had a better way in mind. He emptied me, broke me, then filled me with a new kind of grace. It was a humbling place.

Today, miss beauty stands in all her grandeur on my table. She looks perfect just the way she is – with no head.

I know it’s a little weird. (Maybe a lot weird?) I get it. Some of you think I’m a freak for overanalyzing this random figurine with no head. But hear me out for a minute. This is how I think, this is the way I process life. I’m a firm believer that there’s purpose in everything. Every. Thing.

For me? I needed that trip to the Dominican to bring me to a place of surrender. I needed to lose my head. I needed to stop overanalyzing, to stop planning and purposing my life my way. Kris was right, my “five point plan [wasn’t] going to work anymore.” I needed to surrender my life so God could take it and do immeasurably more than I imagined.

So here I am. 2 1/2 months later with a beautiful statue sitting on the table in front of me. Her head is broken off. But she’s still oh so beautiful.

The day I left for my Compassion trip, I told you I was empty. Completely empty. And several days after that, I told you I was broken. Wholly broken.

I’ve never been the same.

I thought Haiti changed me forever. Now I know Dominican changed me forever in a whole new way.

I’m still empty. I’m still broken.

But I’m more sure of God’s Spirit, God’s sovereignty, God’s ability to work it all out than I’ve ever been.

 

 

 

For six or seven years, I’ve been significantly burdened by all the STUFF we own. Everywhere I look, there’s clutter, STUFF we don’t need or use. I have no problem stating the brutally honest truth about all that STUFF.

I can’t stand it.

It’s exhausting to manage and suffocating to my soul.

I don’t need anymore STUFF.

One of the tasks I’m bound and determined to get a grip on between now and the end of the school year is decluttering our house. The past two and a half weeks, I’ve begun to dig out. I realized from the start that it’s going to be a huge job. In fact, I’ve just begun to scratch the surface with a partial clean-out of one side of our master bedroom, a partial clean-out of our master bathroom, a partial clean-out of our baby’s bedroom, and a pre-Easter dump of seasonal goods we don’t use anymore.

I’ve sorted through old t-shirts and barely-worn lingerie stuffed in dresser drawers, jewelry from junior high, over-the-counter medicines already expired, gross smelling lotions only partly used, and hand-me-down toddler clothes that didn’t get used nearly enough. I donated several pair of pants that didn’t fit anymore, sweaters that have gone out of style, necklaces and bracelets I once thought were real gold but discovered were all fake when I brought them to the Gold Guys in hopes of cash. Books that no longer resonate have been tossed in a donation bag along with the free, but ugly hair clips that came with the hair dryer we bought in December. And I’m embarrassed to say that I’ve saved boxes for a year now. You know why? Because I want to sell a bunch of valuable STUFF on eBay, but putting all that STUFF up for auction takes so much time, I haven’t even gotten to it. So there sit the boxes.

The STUFF.

It’s a burden.

Whether we know it or not, whether we’ve had time to sort through it or not, whether we’ve had time to realize how much we’ve collected or not, it’s a burden to our souls.

We collect, purchase, acquire, buy and borrow hoping all these things will fill the holes in our hearts, this longing for something more. But STUFF doesn’t fill holes in hearts. STUFF fills our houses, fogs our brains, clogs the free-flowing life waiting for us on the other side.

We’re drowning in STUFF.

Me, you, our whole culture.

More is better. Or is it?

What if less is truly more?

What if we stopped believing the lie that STUFF will make us happier?

What if we stopped expecting STUFF to fill the holes in our hearts?

What if we decluttered once and for all?

What if we realized that a life worth living has nothing to do with the acquisition of more STUFF?

What if we released the STUFF and opened our hearts to the possibility that freedom’s waiting on the other side of STUFF?

What if we need clean places, wide open spaces so our hearts and souls can breathe and just be for once?

What if?