You did what??

There are no typos – you read that right.

The thing no one tells you about buying a home in the suburbs is that the interior looks kind of dumb without any furniture. I moved from a one bedroom apartment to a four bedroom house and quickly realized that the cheap folding mat that served as the “couch” in my apartment was not going to cut it in the living room of the suburban house. A trip to Sam Levitz and a few thousand dollars later, I had succeeded in partially filling one of the rooms in the home with a three piece sectional couch.

Fast forward a few years and I found myself divorced, wasting my nights away on the couch; dreaming of traveling the world. An implicit consequence of buying things to fill a home is that they act as an anchoring force. I know too many people that secretly want to travel and explore the world, but can’t force themselves to part ways with the things they’ve acquired.

“But, but, but what am I going to do with the 100+ coffee mugs and closet full of t-shirts I’ve bought from every single place I go?!“

“Do these things still serve me?” is the question I found myself asking and the question I offer to anyone in a similar position.

It’s funny to me how the advertising forces that be have tricked us into cherishing the artifacts of our lives more than the actual experience of living life itself. From the outset, it’s as if the experience of travel is somehow null and void if you don’t collect a tangible item to prove that you were there. For my parents’ generation, it’s coffee mugs and t-shirts. For my generation it’s photos on Instagram, a rampant disease I don’t pretend to be immune from either. This concept extends to the way we design the interior of our homes.

“Live, Laugh, Love!”

“But first, coffee.”

“Life is what happens between coffee and wine.”

Me buying a couch to fill an empty space.

Perhaps this is a metaphor for filling the vacuity of the existence I was living at the time: stuck in a relationship long past it’s expiration date as I sat idly and watched the days of my youth pass by, allowing my dreams to see the world die an antagonizing death.

Perhaps it is easier for people to feed the delusion that their highest values are best represented by the signs hung in their home and the things they’ve purchased.

Perhaps it is a form of conflict avoidance that is easier to stomach than looking in the mirror and admitting they lack the courage to part with things (beliefs) that no longer serve them and live a life authentic to themselves that’s aligned with their highest values.

The couch no longer served me. In the same way living in a four bedroom home in the suburbs as a newly divorced man no longer served me. In the same way many of the limiting beliefs I used to live by no longer serve me.

Like thinking I lacked the background knowledge to do something “extreme” like BASE jumping. Scarcity is the word I’d assign to this mindset. In reality, it’s not that hard:

You open your phone,
Google “BASE jumping near me”,
Make a phone call,
Pay some money,
Fill out a form,
And do it.

The hard part is convincing yourself that you’re worthy of the things you want and having the willingness to attend a funeral for a past version of yourself that you recognize is no longer aligned with your highest values. Your actions are reflective of your highest values and if you really want to do it, you’ll find a way.

No one remembers the three piece sectional couch they bought from Sam Levitz on their deathbed. But they do remember things like going BASE Jumping in Moab.