7.1.1 Clothes

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7 Experiment
1st month
1st post

Recognizing clothing as an area of excess in my life: Rage against the hanger.

This verse hits me right between the eyes every time I read it.  Giving is easy for me.  Fun, even.  I get oddly disproportionate joy from giving anything away, much to the horror of my hoarder mother.

This is why I made clothing my first month.  I am a chicken who wanted to start out easy.  But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that for this to truly be a sacrifice, I would have to give deeply.

I began with counting all of my clothing.  162.  Before I counted, I was so proud about how little I felt clothing was a struggle of excess for me.  But 162?  I was shocked.  So for this first week of clothing, I decided to cut my clothing in half.

81 items of clothing to get rid of.  Easy peasy.  Right?   Well, the first 50ish were.

• Bridesmaid's dresses - Why was I even keeping these?
• Paint clothes - I never paint.
• Clothes that don't fit - Why does anyone keep these?
• Old costumes - Flapper girl, glow worm, train engineer
• Out of style clothing - Um...more than I thought.
• Clothes I can't remember the last time I wore - Tons.
• Anything with holes - Even the shorts from Junior High.
• One item with the price tag on it.  Wow.  Is that not the epitome of excess?

Then I got to the sacrifice part.  The uncomfortable part.  This is when I really started to give.  Before it was cleansing/cleaning.  After that, each item became increasingly difficult.  But this is a battle I willingly wage with myself.

And it is finally accomplished.  But to what end?  Where do I send these clothes?  How do I keep from ending up in this disturbing place of excess once again?  More to come.  Pray for me, people.

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