Letting Things Go

     I have been thinking a lot lately about the concept of letting things go, out of my life, I mean.  Not in terms of selling things.  How does one let go of things that are dear to them and that they have invested a lot of time in? I'm not sure that I know the answer.  It's so hard to say goodbye when it is something that we love and that we really want to keep in our lives, that we want to keep being a part of.
     I've always had this trouble.  Yesterday I wrote about being a collector.  Maybe one of the reasons I collect is due to my trouble with letting things go that I love.  Maybe if I were more comfortable, philosophically, with the idea of letting things go then I wouldn't be such a collector of physical things.  Hmmm...interesting thought. I AM a packrat; I haven't quite reached the status of those people on "Hoarders", and I never will, but I'm always so afraid that if I let it go, then I'll need it again later.  That's probably why I have tools in my barn that I have no idea what to do with.  (They were Stacey's and Dad's).
     I also think that one of the reasons that I hate to let things go is that I have trouble giving up on things or situations.  I don't like to admit defeat.  I'm not a quitter.  I even finish books that I don't particularly like.  It's that seeing something through to completion idea, I guess.  I keep thinking that if I just try a little harder, whatever it is will work out.  This isn't a bad quality, it's just that it doesn't always work out the way you hope it will whether you see it through to the end or not.  And...to make matters worse, what if you're not sure you're really at the end?  "Ah," as Shakespeare said, "there's the rub." 
   I've sort of come to a conclusion about knowing whether I should let something go, and it goes back to something I heard in college.  A person said to me, "If I give it to God, and He gives it back, then it's really mine.  If He doesn't, then it really wasn't mine because He didn't mean for me to have it."  That's profound, I think.  But that to me is the easy part.  
     Maybe the issue isn't even really knowing when I'm at the end of something.  Maybe it's that I do know, and I don't want that to be the answer.  Wow!  Maybe this is really about accepting the will of God.  Maybe this is about being willing to accept a new direction from God but wanting another one.
     Oh brother.  Time to get out His road map.