hoarding junk

I began cleaning my room this morning, starting with the disaster zone (under the bed). Aside from finding several large living and dust bunnies who were thriving, growing and multiplying, I also found a TON of junk...

... half-used pieces of lined paper (yes, kids, back in the day, we actually used notebook paper)
... coffee-flavored gum left over from the summer after my freshman year in college
... empty glue-bottles
... other people's stuff that I've "borrowed" over the last few years
... left-over McDonald's kid's meal toys

Basic gist? I'm a hoarder. I keep everything, even if I will never use it again. It is extremely hard for me to throw ANYTHING away, even old and holey socks.

But as I was rummaging through my junk and making myself throw some things away, I started wondering (to myself)... I wonder if the same is true in life sometimes. I wonder if there is emotional, spiritual, physical, mental junk that we hold to, stashing it under the bed or in dark corners, that we don't need to hold on to? I wonder if at times, we are hoarders of our emotional junk in ways that are unnecessary? We have some of this baggage not because we cannot get rid of it, but because we are too lazy to deal with it, or too attached to it to let go?

... junk from a previous relationship (or a continued emotional attachment)
... hidden anger at a friend
... feelings of entitlement in a given situation (I deserve(d)...)

Please don't get me wrong; there are some things that happen to us or that we wrestle with that are outside of our control. It would be petty, insensitive, and naive of me to suggest that all the junk in our lives is there because we are unwilling to part with it. But I do wonder if there aren't places in which we do hold on to emotional/spiritual junk that we don't need to...

At the end of the day, dust bunnies can appear soft and fuzzy. We like our junk: it's familiar and it's comfortable. But it rarely, if ever, makes a positive impact on anything. It just makes a mess.

Sometimes it's just time to chuck the junk and clean under the bed.