One thing that I have always tried to do is meet the practical needs of my friends. It is something that I genuinely take pleasure in doing. The basis of this story involves me helping a friend who had a practical need. She did not have a car, so I asked her if she would like to borrow mine to get groceries. She agreed, and I let her borrow my car for a few hours so she could run to Wal-Mart.
As I met her at her apartment, we began to unload my car. Much to my dismay, I saw her pop open my trunk. “NO!” I thought to myself, as I saw her groceries neatly tucked in around all the random junk in my trunk. I immediately became apologetic and said that I was sorry that she had to see that mess.
“Whatever, dude. It’s your trunk.” She said to me, probably confused at my reaction to her seeing my messy trunk. We went inside and loaded everything into her refrigerator and then went to meet our friends. I eventually calmed down about her seeing my trunk, and I began to think about how ridiculous my thought was.
Looking back, I can now see how our lives are sort of that way. I tend to put my stuff that I do not want people to see in my trunk, and keep the main part of my car clean. Out of sight, out of mind. But if someone were to open up my trunk, they would see what I really have. It can be scary at times, and I felt vulnerable when I realized that she could see my mess. She did not care that I had junk in there, she was just happy that I loaned her my car and she was grateful for that.
I have to think about my own trunk now, and realize that I accumulate a lot of “stuff” in there. Some of it is mine and I bring it in there, but a lot of it are things that others put in there and I have to remove. The first question that I have to ask is, “can we sort out what is not our from what is ours?” When I begin to look at my trunk, I find that a lot of the garbage was placed there by other people.
What I have done over the past few years is find ways to leave behind that stuff when I find it. I identify whose baggage it really is, and then give it back to them or dispose of it. Our cars do not run as efficiently when they are loaded up.
The other detail is that I had a friend who reacted kindly to my mess. Do we have people in our lives that can look at our mess, and still hang around? More so, if you need them, can they help you sort out the mess and send it back to the rightful owner? Often times, we feel like we have to have everything together and in order or else people will look down on us. The truth is, that some people will do it. But they are not true friends. They have their own junk that they have to get rid of! We all have stuff back there, so no one is above another person. It might look different, but it is all junk.
Finally, do you have the courage to go to the back and sort out what is back there? It is easy to pop the trunk, and throw something in there without looking. But we all know what happens to something in dark areas, it begins to get worse. That is why it is important to be careful of what you put into your trunk, and to keep it clean. It can be embarrassing or painful at times to do it, but remember that you will feel a lot better about yourself after it is done.
So if you have free time this week, my hope is that you can do an inventory of your trunk, and try to identify what needs to be there and what does not need to be there. It is always interesting to see!
