How To Know What To Let Go

It was a quiet afternoon so I decided to check in on social media. I had recently shared about letting go and pruning our home to create space in our lives for that which matters most (health, family, community, so on). 

I logged on to Facebook and saw the familiar sign of a notification. I clicked over to see that it was a comment. A question rather. 

She shared that she wanted to let go, that she wanted freedom from the weight, that she wanted space (oh does she crave the space!), but one thing kept her from all of that. And that one thing became her question. She asked, "Jennifer, how do I determine what to let go when everything seems so important or valuable or necessary?"

I began tapping away on the keyboard readying my answer, but then I paused for some reflection. It has always been easy for me to talk about pruning and letting go and I've never discounted that it is in fact hard work in real life. The same way as it is hard work shedding thirty extra pounds that have crept in over the years. Changing up what we eat and moving our body consistently isn't necessarily easy. Eating takeout and watching Netflix, that is what's easy. 

The same rings true for simplifying our home. It's not easy pulling out everything and sorting it into piles and making decision AFTER DECISION about what to keep and what to release. It is the opposite of easy. It is messy. 

What IS easy is continuing the shopping and the ordering of bins and containerizing our excess. Adding a label and calling it organized. 

Just like I cannot will myself into a size 2 without the work, we cannot will our way into peace and freedom without the purging. 

If letting go is a required part of the process, then how, oh gosh how, do I discern. 

Watch the video below as I walk you through three questions to ask yourself when it comes to letting go.