My taste is modern minimalist. Anyone who has been to my apartment can immediately know this about me. Everything in my apartment has its place. If you were to ask me where anything is at any moment in time, I could go directly to it and immediately retrieve it. I wouldn’t have to find anything because I always know where everything is. I have always been this way. When you are like this, and you already only have things you really want and need, some days it’s difficult to find out what to give away.
I am becoming more acutely aware of what I need and what I want. Also, that need is as subjective as want. I live an uncluttered life already. Over the years, I have only kept the things I absolutely need and those that I imperatively want. Yet, as I contemplate letting things go for this project, I am noticing the line becomes obscured.
I thought I needed 1000s of books, but it’s just that I really wanted them. In terms of need, there are certain things I need for my health, for example, my toiletries, some clothes, my contacts. There are certain things I need for my livelihood, such as my art tools, tech tools and camera.
It then comes down to a question of leisure, ease and comfort. What am I keeping out of necessity and what am I holding onto out of desire for pleasure and comfort? I am not a monk, nor do I have the desire to become one. I am a very blissful person who loves my life, I love beautiful things, decadent food, comfort, my apartment, the people I surround myself with, and I live in a city filled with culture, art, and opportunity. I love these things.
The objective of 365 Release, is to examine how I am attached to the things around me, and to practice letting go, when it is appropriate. Not to simply get rid of things.
In other words, I am discovering a more intricate inner working to what I feel attached to. Each letting go has been a grandiose lesson for me, even beyond what I have been able to express in writing. It has opened up creativity, compassion, and constant thought.
That said, today I am releasing not one, but several books, because as I discovered in Day 2, my attachment to them is not essential, it is more intricate and involved in multiple layers of attachment.
I am giving away the following to different people:
Call to Home: African American Reclaim the Rural South, Carol Stack
Ar’n’t I a Woman?: Females Slaves in the Plantation South, Deborah Gray White
Apology, Socrates
The Promise of the City: Space, Identity and Politics in Contemporary Social Thought, Kian Tajbakhsh
Selected Poems, Octavio Paz
The Post Modern Turn, ed. By Steven Sidman
Toward A People’s Art, Cockcroft, Weber & Cockcroft
A Restricted Country, Joan Nestle
Dry Bones Rattling: Community Building to Revitalize American Democracy, Mark R. Warren
Feminist Interpretations of Michel Foucault, ed. By Susan J Hekman
Only Words, Catherine A. MacKinnon
I am grateful to everyone who has been receiving my releases. Because you receive them, I love you. You are helping me grow.
On day 10 of my 365 Release practice, I reflect on want and need, and how often, those two are one and the same, and at other times they are entirely separate.
Wow YK, this is wonderful! I will be following your journey. I am sure it will be enlightening and transforming for me as well. Thank you for sharing.
hey hon, thank you for being on the journey. hope to see you soon! hope the trees are cleared around your street, looks like it was hit hard there as well as my own.