Read more of Stephanie’s contributions to allmomdoes here.
We all have it. That one pair of pants. Or maybe it’s a shirt. The one that hasn’t fit in years but we hang onto it. Maybe we tell ourselves it’s for “motivation”. If we have it hanging in the closet or even tucked away in a drawer – surely it will motivate us to get back to the body we were at when it fit. We can’t get rid of it because certainly one day it will again fit and we will wish we had that exact item of clothing. After all, money was spent on it and it would just be wrong not to keep it for the future you when you can wear it again.
If you are like me, it’s more than one item of clothing. In fact, I had a whole season worth of clothes I kept insisting to myself would fit again.
Someday.
But as I was rummaging through my warm weather clothing to be ready for summer which is fast approaching, I found myself getting less and less excited for the season. Instead, all it did was force me to come up with excuses as to why something didn’t fit or why it probably would soon. I started separating out the things I would bring upstairs to my closet and the things that would stay put until next year.
You know, next year – when apparently the too small clothes of today would magically fit.
I paused.
It was a sad slow pause and I battled with myself internally for several minutes just standing there staring at the clothes.
I made a decision. Those clothes were not bringing me joy. In fact, they were bringing me the opposite of joy. I realized that hanging onto them was doing way more negative than it was positive. I claim to be organized and somewhat of a minimalist when it comes to holding onto things for sentimental reasons. I also claim to be focused on being healthy versus looking a certain way. Yet I realized that clearly there was something holding me back when it came to this particular tote of summer clothes.
That something was me.
After I took that slow pause I made my decision and knew I had to act on it immediately. Otherwise I was afraid I would change my mind. I took that tote and put it straight into the back of my husband’s car along with other items we had for donation. He is also a minimalist and he seriously loves outings to the dump or to Goodwill. So this basically gave him something to do and I was lucky that meant that tote wasn’t looming around for weeks.
It was not just out of sight hiding in a storage closet waiting for me to find it a year later and be sad or annoyed or one of the other emotions that it brought. It was gone.
Honestly, I wish I had done it sooner. But it’s done now and I am so happy to know I won’t have it waiting for me to find next season.
If you are battling something similar I hope you too can pause and make a decision that brings you joy over all other emotions. I promise you, it’s the right decision.
Related:
I Lost Weight and Gained It Back. Here’s What Happened Next.
