Soulful Simplicity by Courtney Carver

Author:Courtney Carver
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2017-12-26T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The Sound of Letting Go

One morning I woke up in Portland, Oregon, in a cozy Airbnb rental at 5:30 a.m. I like to wake up gently, but that day I was startled awake. It was trash day in the neighborhood I called home for a few nights, and collecting the trash isn’t a gentle process. I was in Portland for the Tiny Wardrobe Tour, events in thirty-three different cities to chat about living and dressing with less. I had spent the evening before with a room full of wonderful, thoughtful people. I shared my stories, answered questions, and encouraged everyone to let go. Sometimes I forget that letting go isn’t always easy. For some people, attachment isn’t an issue. It’s easy to let go. For most people, though, myself included, letting go doesn’t come naturally. It takes practice and at first it might be painful. The sound of plastic bins being dragged across asphalt that morning in Portland reminded me of the sound that letting go makes.

From the screech and hiss of the air brakes to the giant mechanical claws wrapping around the bins, to pounds of glass and plastic falling from one container to the next, my eyes flew open. The clattering metal and machinery, humming diesel engine, and whooshing hydraulics filled my ears and mind. The ripping, tearing, and crushing noises reminded me of letting go, but that wasn’t the sound of letting go. The scary, jarring noises I heard were the sounds of fear and attachment, the sounds of holding on too tight. Letting go may be hard, but please consider that holding on is harder. You have to hold on every day, and not just to the stuff. You hold on to fear of not having enough, the stress of taking care of everything, and the guilt of spending too much or keeping things you don’t use. All the holding on is noisy—deafening sometimes.

As the truck finally pulled away and left me in the early morning silence, I remembered the real sound of letting go: the sound I heard when I started decluttering and letting go, the sound of empty rooms in our house, the sound of walking into our new, smaller space, the sound of becoming debt-free, of waking up stress-free, the sound of being light, and the sound of Monday morning walks instead of Monday morning meetings. That’s what letting go sounds like.

The sound of letting go is not the painful, screeching sound I woke up to. Instead, it’s the sound of welcoming a new day before the sun comes up, that sound when you can almost hear the stars twinkling.

The calm, the peace, the relief, the joy . . . that’s the sound of letting go.

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