Not a Post About Writing

There is so much chaos in the world right now that I feel a little fragmented from it.  I feel myself being agitated and on edge and I don't like it.  People are not being kind, and I really need a break from all that heat.  I am stepping back from facebook in February, doing a little Facebook Free February Challenge, and it will be a challenge for me, I am very aware of facebook.  I love keeping up with friends that I haven't seen in years and I love seeing pictures of their lives and families.  Unfortunately, all the political yuck has taken facebook over and I feel frustrated.  So I am going to take a breather.  Actually I am taking a couple of breathers.  I changed my homepage to Bing.com because I got tired of yahoo blasting me with politics every time I opened my computer.  Now I am offered a search box and a beautiful, calming image.  What could possibly be better.  I highly recommend it.  As on offshoot of all the noise in the world I started feeling overwhelmed with my environment.  We have a lovely home, with plenty of space but I felt suddenly cramped and closed in and when I sat down at my computer to write all I could see was the clutter.I started in my closet, rearranging, packaging things I don't wear for donation, then I moved into the bedroom.  I felt so liberated just getting through the closet, it was amazing.  A good friend recommended "The Life changing Magic of Tidying Up" by Marie Kondo.  I downloaded it and listened, through the day as I tidied my room.  The girls were playing pretty happily and occassionaly came to join my fun.  I woke up this morning thinking about all the things in the kitchen I don't use and how I could just donate or discard unloved things and I would have so much more space.  It would be so much easier to keep my home in order if there were fewer things. I started with the forty odd cookbooks that were taking up a chunk of my pantry.  If I haven't used it in the last year then it needs to go.  I know what I cook and if I need a recipe I generally hit the internet anyway.  Clutter!  So all of those beautiful books are now listed for sale on Amazon, along with about a hundred novels that i read and enjoyed but know I will never read again.  They are taking up my space and they have to go.I started the year by taking charge of my finances and getting a clear understanding of how much money I was wasting every day, while thinking "how frugal" I was being.  I shut myself off from my credit cards and began the boring process of paying for all the things I have bought, things I don't remember necessarily buying, but still am buying.  Ugh.In January I chose the word Need to guide me in 2017.  I though long and hard about it and when that one word kept coming to me I felt it chose me.  I am trying to mindful about everything.  Do I need to eat that cupcake, as opposed to want?  Is it going to make me healthier or stronger or better in any way?  Do I need to buy that shirt, to go with the other ten button up shirts I have in my closet?  Do I need new jeans to go with the thirty pairs of pants I already own. Do I need a new wallet? Or will the one I have work for another year?  Does it do it's job?  This is probably just normal every day thinnking for most people, but I realize that I have not often told myself no.  I think now, that no is maybe a very important word to have in your vocabulary.Hope you are all having a wonderful January.  I will let you know how my tidying up goes as I move along.