The Other One

Just use The Other One. One Other. The singular alternative thing.

The joy of having no choice....

I had a glorious moment by the sink the other day. Maybe not quite an epiphany. But a little flutter of joy and gratitude that let me know that I'm on the right track with all this simplication business. A reaffirmation of the relief of having less stuff. That having less stuff was paying me back.

I was about to start cooking something. And I was reaching for the wooden spoon in front of me, in the drying rack by the sink. Clean, but still wet. I didn't want to use a wet spoon for frying onions. Something subconscious about getting something dirty that was still recovering from the last time it was dirty, I suppose. And I had a little internal sigh.

I was going to have to find, choose, select, decide upon another implement. The realisation that I was going to have to make a choice made me a little sad. I was going to have to find, and then expend, Decision Energy on a flipping kitchen utensil. At the end of a frustrating day (I can't remember why it was frustrating, but at my hormonal life stage ALL days are frustrating) this was a dispiriting moment.

But then - just as quickly and subconsciously - my heart did a little upwards skip. I'll just use The Other One. I have ONE other wooden spoon by the hob and I can just pick that one up and use it. No decisions. No thought processes. No thumbing through the selection of spoons to chose the 'best' one for the task at hand. JUST USE THE OTHER ONE!!!!!

Oh my goodness. It sounds facile and trivial, but the rush of relief and self-gratitude that I felt was the best thing about the day (well, it turns out, the only thing I remember of the day....). I had given myself the gift of NOT HAVING TO MAKE A CHOICE! I think I may even have voiced a little 'yippee' out loud.

It seems like such a trivial thing. It seemed like such a trivial thing even at the time. But that wave of positive emotion that my No Choice Moment gave me was remarkable. And here I am remarking on it. Why was it so remarkable? Because it was evidence that I had just enough stuff.

ENOUGH

[OK, that's a really weird word when you look at it for too long...]

Downsizing, decluttering, growing up - whatever you call it - is Hard Work. And how do you know when you're done? How can you be sure that you're not becoming a wee bit obsessive and thinking about stuff - actual stuff - a bit too much? [Or is that just me? I do have an overactive inner voice.]. It turns out that when you've nailed it, even in a tiny little way like the number of wooden spoons, you get to feel RELIEVED. You get an extra moment of lightness. And you get to not have a little micro-stress, choice, energy moment.

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