Today’s blog will be an update and comments on two projects which I wrote about recently, “Swedish Death Cleaning,” and “Lifetime Leaning.” I started both projects a while back and they are my current obsessions or activities that I’m really deeply involved in. This is not a bad thing. In fact, I’m in one sense really enjoying these activities, or, well, at least glad I’m finally doing them and have the self-discipline to push through and see some results. In another sense, they are driving me crazy and to the edge of my sanity.
First off, let me say my death cleaning project is well, horrendous. Those of you who have had to clean up the mess of someone after they have died know what I’m referring to. Going through someone’s life accumulation of junk and other clutter and important papers is, well, not pleasant and pushes almost every button emotionally and psychologically. I can’t work at that project more than an hour or so without nearly losing my mind. So much stuff that has just piled up in a drawer or a corner of a room or wherever. So much stuff. So many memories (not all good ones, by the way).
Anyway, after reading a book on Swedish Death Cleaning a while back, I realized it was time to get my stuff in order and clear out a lot of junk. It’s going to take hundreds of hours more to get where I want to get, but I’m steadily working at it. Thank God my spouse is very supportive, or I know I’d never get through this without losing my mind. And it’s not easy to think of the end of life as I’m doing all of this, and that is what is on my mind as I proceed in doing this almost daily activity. We don’t like to ponder this subject much, do we? But we’ve got to, as I see it.
So, let me turn to another subject that I wrote about a while back, lifetime learning. I used to sell educational and motivational cassette tapes for about twenty years as a second job besides my airline job. I bought tapes from several companies and sold them in different stores as my own business. I guess I had an interest in education and motivation and it was an enjoyable job being a distributor of the products.
When I closed down that business a while back, I had quite a collection of the tapes leftover and I just stored them away in my garage for years. Well, as I stated in my blog many months ago, I came across those stored tapes and thought, what will I do with these? Just throw them away or perhaps listen to them? Many of the tapes I had not listened to, especially the more academic ones on philosophy and religion and psychology, etc. Well, I started to listen to them and decided I would like to transfer them to CDs and start a library of them for my own “continuing education,’ or lifetime learning as they call it now.
I did convert the best ones to CDs and started an in-depth study of the subjects I was interested in. As I was doing that tape to CD conversion I came across a CD and a DVD I had that I purchased from an educational company years ago. I got a catalog from that company one day urging me to come back and try out another course of theirs. I somehow resisted the urge to toss out that catalog and decided to give that company another chance to interest my curiosity in subjects of my interest. Well, I ordered a course of college / university lectures, and I was hooked. I have since purchased many, many additional courses in my fields of interest. Yep, they got me addicted to lifetime learning.
So, with the pandemic keeping us pretty much isolated and at home for many months, I have occupied much of my time with my two current projects. My death cleaning and my continuing education. Really had the time to devote to the projects and they did consume my time and energy. I’m clearing out my life substantially of unnecessary stuff and I’m putting into my life some good, intellectually and academically stimulating education and learning. It is a good feeling. I guess you could see it as, “out with the old and in with the new.”
So, is my lifetime learning/continuing education a challenge for me also? Ah, yes. I do not claim to be an intellectual or an academician. In fact, far from that. I’m just an average person, intellectually, as I see it. I have favorite subjects which I really enjoy and do understand to some extent. Then there are subjects I just do not seem to comprehend much. But that’s okay, really. The science courses I really don’t understand much at all. Way beyond my grasp. Oh, well, I do them anyway and perhaps later will make some sense of them. But the subjects I really have an interest in I enjoy immensely.
I am enjoying the history, philosophy, religion, psychology cultural courses. I’ve done a lot of study recently on evil and finding that subject is very relevant to today’s world, especially the political world. Studying Hitler’s Empire, I find very revealing on how people fall into a cult-like authoritarian political mind set. Evil has always been around as history has shown. A lot to be learned by studying it.
So, if we pick our addictions, I’m pretty satisfied with mine. A cleaned up, simplified, organized life, and an open mind to learning more about our world. I don’t need a recovery or twelve-step program for my current addictions. I’m glad about that.
Wally