Dr. Glenn Mollette
A few years back my wife’s parents passed and the time came to sell their house. The house was nice and had nice furniture. When the house sold a lot of their belongings ended up on the street for anyone to carry off.
Even though there were children and grandchildren, no one had room for most of her parents’ stuff. A number of pieces of furniture were put into use by family members, but so much of it went out the door to parts unknown.
Chances are you have an attic, basement, garage or closets filled with stuff. Stuff can be clothes, furniture, collections, memorabilia and more. Where will all this stuff end up? Most likely it will be hauled to a garbage dump or possibly to some non-profit who will make it very profitable.
When a non-profit sells your old sofa, table or clothes they come out pretty good because they have nothing invested except some labor and building costs. That makes it very profitable for them. I am not knocking any non-profits because some do some great charitable work. Some pay their Chief Executive Officers big salaries.
You have to make choices as to where you donate. What happens is that so many people become so desperate to get rid of their stuff that they don’t have the time to care about how it is sold or used. The main goal is to clean out the garage or storage building.
We will all experience this on some level. We will be responsible for disposing of someone else’s stuff or someone will dispose of ours. I really don’t want family to have to do that but often we don’t get to choose.
What we might consider doing is being proactive today. Clean out one closet, one shelf, one section of an attic and put it where we want. Most likely this could be a dumpster, but it might be to someone who could use it for the time being.
My wife and I bought my dad a jacket for his birthday and he got to wear it about three months before he died. My brother-in-law ended up with the jacket because it was a good fit. He wore it for several years before he died. I think it is satisfying if we can pass on something that someone else can use for a while.
If you have stuff that you have not used or worn in a couple of years then what is the point of it taking up space? I do have a couple of suits I have held on to because, if I can just lose ten pounds, I will be able to wear them again. Sadly, it sure is taking me a long time to lose the ten pounds, but maybe eventually I will.
We can’t take anything with us when our lives end. We came into the world with nothing and we leave with nothing. Living in peace with God and man is the best we can do internally and externally. Everything else is just stuff.
