Recently, Lisa and I looked around and determined that clutter was freezing us up. That’s right, I said clutter. If upwards of 80% of stress is caused by disorganization, then it’s got to go. You say, “Mark that doesn’t sound like a very spiritual issue.” I say “Whatever, for us it is; it’s distracting us from being effective in other areas of life.” So we decided that we were going to win the war on clutter and now we’re winning instead of whining. I’m just not willing to “let myself go” in any area of life—and something as simple as clutter had become a metaphor for us.
Like camping on the deck the other night. I know it’s another small example but I just don’t have any major issues in my life right now; when I get some, I’ll be sure to share. But even the smaller things matter because progress is often the aggregate of little things. So camping on the deck. It was my stupid idea, but then I found myself trying to talk the kids out of it because I just wanted to sleep in my comfortable bed. I’m older now. I get sore you know. But then I came to my senses and I remembered, “I’m a dad. It’s my lot. It’s not about me. While they’re still young, it’s about them. So be a man and get out there and set up the tents.” So I decided to die to my want. The Result: the experience with my kids was way better than a comfortable night’s sleep. It in fact was so superior that we went camping again this past Friday night, this time for real, at Fort Fredrick in the great outdoors. No bathrooms, no showers, no mattresses, no cable, no internet, no blah, blah, blah… and we’ll never forget it, and hopefully it will inspire my kids to one day endure uncomfortable things for the sake of fun with their kids and so and so forth. We need to die to ourselves even in the small things of life to experience the really good things of life.
