Do-It-Yourself Exorcism!

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"I'm telling you, get rid of those old magazines or you'll never sell your novel!"

Why spend time and money hiring pricey clergy to banish evil spirits from your home when you can do it yourself? All you need is a few hours and a desire to move on in your life.

Okay, here's where I tell a little life story that will make sense of my humorous intro. We have a small room that we use as an office (essential as yours truly runs this mini-empire from home), but it has limited storage space. Back when I was newly freelance [read: had just been laid off], I kept lots of copies of the magazines I was writing for as reference. I couldn't put them on the desk anymore, so I used a shelf in our linen closet.

Time sauntered on, as it will when it's feeling sassy, and the work I did with these magazines fell away, replaced by a book and other kinds of work–including taking care of the house. Every time I went to get fresh towels or bedsheets, I'd see the old magazines, and somewhere in my head was a thought: I don't work for them anymore (sigh).

Keeping around old things we don't use and that make us feel bad was the subject of SHED Your Stuff, Change Your Life, a book by organizer extraordinaire Julie Morgenstern. She wrote about keeping things from a previous vocation, and how, when she finally got rid of it, her new career began. I remembered this one day when getting a clean washcloth. I saw the old magazines, the pile for reference that hadn't been referenced in three years. In fact, the only reference it had was to the past–one I wanted to move on from.

Oh, the hours of fun I had going through those mags, tearing out articles I'd written and photos of cute hairstyles, and then recycling them. What took their place in the linen closet? Copies of my books, with space for more.

Now, I am rather airy-fairy and I do believe in this stuff, and if you don't, toutes fines. But witnesseth: Since my purge, I have officially signed with a rock star fiction agent, and a few amazing work opportunities have popped up.

So look around you. (Yes, right now.) If you see anything–photos of exes, notes with stern admonishments about losing weight instead of encouragement, books with titles implying you're a dummy–that gives you the icks, it may be creating bad juju that keeps you from moving on. Get rid of it. (Yes, right now.) Recycle and donate where you can, because one person's demon is another person's treasure. But exorcise those demons, and be reborn.

Hallelujah,

S