The Dining Room Table

So, how’s our dining room table look? Our clutter corner? Our junk drawer? We all have these little areas of our lives that are in varying levels of disarray. The “I’ll deal with it later” parts of our life we clear off or tuck away when guests come to visit.

Think about the people on the show Hoarders. Mostly due to losses in their lives, these struggling folks try to hold onto “stuff” to fill the void in their lives. They convert from having a cluttered dining room table (which is probably a good share of U.S. households) to a life-sized deadly game of Jenga; with stacks of who knows what to the ceiling.

It’s easy to judge these people, because their stacks are visible to us. Boy, do they need some help, we think. Then again, what do we need to purge out of our own lives before extremes take over the balance?

Let’s think about our health just like that dining room table. Absolutely, there’s some stuff sitting there waiting to be dealt with. But we might ask ourselves: When is it time to make that happen? When does it go from, yeah, I’ve got to get around to it, to holy cow, I’m paralyzed by how big this job has become?

A collection of cats wasn’t built in a day, just like a 25-pound weight gain doesn’t happen because we order dessert one time at a restaurant. We adopt most of our pounds one at a time too.

We have the power of choice. Striving for perfection is our first mistake, because life is an ongoing journey.

Just like that clean table, all it takes is some type of distraction and the “deal with it later” stack rises again. Keep finding little checks and balances to keep on the right track. Each of us has our own special set of challenges, though that doesn’t mean they are insurmountable. Get going now to have 2012 become a year of better balance. You are worth it!

All my best,
Michelle