Objects and the distance between them (and us!)

Being silenced or dis-empowered or overpowered is hard. There are those who will not hear us, no matter how loudly we shout, then there is the pain of humans that may lay covered over by a visible problem like hoarding, I just listened to an interview about this with a psychologist that aired on the Radio National morning program Life Matters an hour ago. What came across is that those who try to step in due to being concerned about a loved one’s hoarding often do more harm to their mental health than anything.. by suggesting they clear out or throw away objects to which personal energy has become attached, bound up or arrested.. Listening to the interview made me think of how, in the absence of having a loving parent or caregiver to turn to or being left alone a lot, we turn towards substances or objects investing them with a value or emotions and projecting all kinds of our own inner stuff and energy onto these things.

I must say I am not a hoarder but at times I get concerned about the number of books and cloths and sentimental objects retained from both my Mum and older sister’s life (both now passed.) I have a pair of knee socks that were my Godfather’s too that I sleep with everynight under a pillow, these just remind me of the love he showed me and I can still see him as he looked when he would turn up to visit us or I would be sent down to visit him. Uncle Piet would always be wearing these long socks with sandals and he would always look at me and say with a big smile on his face “holy smoke, you’ve grown” in a family where I wasn’t seen or liked or understood much this meant a lot to me.

My compassion goes out to the hoarders, they often have a lot of unspoken damage in the past and perhaps loss and broken connections.. My older sister was like this, at the care home I would often move around the room dusting things for her there was so much she had in that small room. A week after her passing my Mum and I started to clear it out. We decided to do this over two weeks but it involved a lot of sorting as there were letters there as well as clothes and pieces of craft she did, nick nacks and books, cards and letters from one of her 4 sons from whose lives she was unwillingly removed in 1983 and a lot of magazines, nail polishes in a box and other items.. Mum kept two things following this clean out. A small cushion embroidered with the words Live, Laugh and Love and a small glass ornament with a flower engraved inside of it.. After Mum died I kept both of these things.. They are precious to me. I do not see holding onto them as a mistake or aberration or sign of ‘mental illness’, though others might.

I remember when I heard about my living sister and my Mum forceably removing my older sister to aged care when I was overseas, they really did ride roughshot over her, it just occurs to me that my living sister has similarly been moved without much choice into aged care in recent months.. who knows if that is not a bit of karma working out I do not know.. This other sister is not a hoarder at all, I would be more likely to fall into that category but this is something I work with every day.

Last night I threw out a few things and put another few items of clothing on the pile for charity.. Seeing I live an introverted life a concern with the objects around me does take up a lot of my time, that comes down to having been left alone as a child. That said new relationships are coming I just notice that often its others who at times make the effort to connect.. This is something I am working to change within limits.. but its all down to feeling that at the moment with Venus slowly moving forward that I may be able to get creative about the elements of my life as I mixed them around as well as becoming aware of what thoughts, perceptions and behavior as well as connections I give time and value to…

Each life is a work in progress, it really is, we live and learn, mostly through our pain, errors, defects or mistakes and then make modifications.. To say we never make any mistakes and regret nothing does not make a heap of sense and may come from a false pride or arrogance or fear of being human. From another point of view we were doing all we could at the time even if somewhere deep in our consciousness we heard a small voice telling us to do something else, maybe then the learning in time means being more open to hearing and acting upon that internal guidance.