The Benefit of my Self-Doubt...

 Changing your life is like cleaning out the closet....it's packed...you don't want to deal with it.   You keep the door closed...walk fast through the room, looking the other way.  Deep down you fear that if you look at it, you will feel guilty....shamed into cleaning it up and out.  You'll come up with all sorts of projects to avoid getting your hands dirty.

While you are avoiding digging in to a major commitment, the cats are making nests in the back of the closet, leaving their hair all over...snagging your blouses.  Fifteen spiders move in and leave fly carcasses everywhere.  Half of your clothes become Glamour Don'ts, while you hedge responsibility.  Moths eat through your old coats...maybe a mouse sets up residence.....poops all over your old games...chews through that scrapbook from your childhood.....time yellows your pictures...each turn of the clock hands, you give over this project that has your name all over it.  Other things...beings...benefit thanks to your passive resistance against the inevitable.

On the surface, you feel as if your resistance is the control factor...you won't touch it...you are in control.  Meanwhile, while your head is purposefully turned away, a multitude of life's happenings are occurring, without one thought about why you are not taking charge and "cleaning house."  The fifteen spiders don't sit on the fly carcasses and hold a meeting about how they should really organize your slacks.  The resident mouse isn't choosing which of the "games" should be trashed.   The cats aren't sweeping up this "hairy" situation you are in...and time waits for no one.

This "life" that is happening, while you hide your eyes, procrastinate and avoid, is living, because you've stopped.  Your paralysis in the face of challenge has made room for others to thrive.  Those living, while you stand stock still, aren't being mean....the fact that they don't care has nothing to do with you...they aren't thinking about you at all.  They are attending to their business.

If you suddenly decided to take action...bring in the trash bags...dust off what belongs to you....toss away the things you don't need...take ownership, again, of your treasures....everything would keep living, but they would move out of your way...they'd let you handle your business....One of the spiders might give you the finger....the cats might complain...and the mouse might rent another spot in town...but then all of this belonged to you in the beginning...when it was new, and you used it every day.  There was a time when no one dared lay claim to your "closeted" things, because you "owned" them...they were are part you...everyday.

Then, slowly, day by day, you  tucked away what you cared about....you ignored them..."forgot" they were there.  Someone made fun of that coat....someone didn't like the way you played that game, because they didn't win...no one was interested in seeing or hearing about your childhood, so you tucked that scrapbook away.  Soon the closet was so full that you can almost see the closed door pulse like your own heartbeat.  Because everything about you is in there and you are turning your head, because you can't bear to look.  Better to avoid than face everything about yourself that you have forgotten or left unused.

In truth, if you leave it, someone else will pick it up. Your trash is their treasure.  After all, if you toss something aside, you are just giving someone else the benefit of your self-doubt....