Money VS Value
Look around your room, house, and closet. How much do you have? Is it serving you or slaving you?
I had a scare this past week. I found an eviction notice taped to my door but with a post it note to talk my landlord because he really wanted to work things out, being the amazing tenet here I am. Not to brag, I’m a person you want to rent your property to. Plus, in April it will have been two years here. I was only a few days short but I knew I wouldn’t make it so I had let him know ahead of time and I guess he was preparing for the worst.
So I shot him a text and he asked to chat Monday (keep in mind I tried to have an actual face to face meeting two weeks prior to all of this) so I had some days to kill since I had the weekend off from work. So to keep my mind busy and didn’t drive myself crazy thinking about it, I began to pack. Take things off the wall, put things in boxes, really dive into everything. Keep in mind I love in a very small studio apartment with a closet/built in shelving area and bathroom.
So I’m sitting around with all this shit, and I think to myself, where did all this come from? Why do I have this? Of course I knew where it came from, I know why I had it, I knew what it cost, and just the thought was depressing of having to perhaps lug it from one location to another. I had even purged earlier that year. But found myself keeping things even when I didn’t know why. I’d get ready to throw something in a bag to get rid of then think “I model occasionally, perhaps I keep that” or “I found that at a flea market, I’ve never seen anything like it, I can’t just throw it away” and into a box it went.
When you have less space than the average human, you notice the clutter even more. On top of the overwhelming “I have nowhere to go, I’m going to have to live in my car…in an Iowa winter and get rid of my cats”, I was basically in tears while I packed. And so much of the stuff that I was packing was all massage school stuff. Which broke my heart.
I’ve spent nearly two years of my life and probably close to fifteen grand chasing my passion. I have all my tools, my table, my text books, my notebooks, everything to show that that I really gave it my all, for once in my life. But due to being born with a slightly longer ulna bone (one of your arm bones for you non-nerds) which causes Ulnar Impaction Syndrome which is a degenerative wrist condition. Which flared up in my second to last class so I won’t be able to finish school, I can’t even get the piece of paper saying I passed since I cannot participate in clinic hours. Long story short, I was so close to being finished with something until my wrist flared up and we learned this was a problem I have so I cannot finish school.
But now I have all this stuff to start working, to become someone. I had this amazing idea I’ll never get to practice and use unless I want my wrist to go out even faster. I’ve tried switching to left handed activities but I’m no good as a leftie. So, I’ve got all this stuff, so much stuff, taking up space and looking at it brings me sadness. But I think to myself I can’t just get rid of it and if I put it up for sale, no one would pay what it was worth. They would barter and basically rip me off.
Then a switch flips, why has money become such a major factor in my life? For years, money meant nothing. I paid my bills, I didn’t save, I bought what I wanted or did what I wanted without ever thinking about money. But now, and perhaps it’s the fact I don’t have money right now which I’m not used to, I look at things and think how much is this worth?
My brain gets even darker when I think, what am I worth? If I couldn’t get a job I seriously considered becoming a cam girl just to make money, how much would people pay to watch me do different things. How did I become this person? How do we stop putting so much importance on money? Do I just get rid of everything massage related and hope that’s just not putting a Band-Aid on a wound? Or would getting rid of it just make me sadder and make me feel empty?
If I find something that I love, that sets my soul ablaze again, will the constant worry of the value of what I own go away? Is having something I loved taken away causing the concern of money. Or maybe I’m not concerned about money at all but perhaps the value. The value of everything. Or the lack of value coming from others towards me or my life.
I guess it really is all in the perspective.