Extra, Extra: Feel All About It!

Looking beneath the habit of Excess

There’s something about this time of year.

Spring.

Maybe it’s my birthday—April 15, or the new moon—April 17.

For me, and perhaps many of you, it’s a time to naturally turn toward eliminating excess, what’s full, tight, crowded. A quiet impulse to thin things out, to refresh, to feel spacious.

My wife and I downsized about two years ago. It’s been humbling—how much we’ve had to let go of. Crates from prior moves, never unpacked. Boxes of many lives lived long gone. Throwing some things away felt irreverent. Yet so many things not needed for daily life. Just… there. Taking up space.

Extra.

And somewhere in the middle of emptying a box, clearing a closet, I noticed—This isn’t only happening in the house.

At the sink, washing dishes, my body was holding. My glutes tight. Working hard—but not needed.

Extra.

Watching television—my chest tight, hands gripped. I’m just sitting. No immediate threat. Nothing is required.

Extra.

Walking, I feel my body moving, but also something added—a subtle tension in the shoulders, in the arms. More than what’s needed.

Extra.

Perhaps I’m not unlike you.

We keep things.

In our homes.
In our bodies.

Like the unopened boxes.
Like the worries we’ve carried for decades.

Not always because they’re needed—
but because they’re habit.

Extra.

That is, until we invite awareness.

It’s natural to want to fill space, to add, but it’s impossible to complete this task. There is always more space than anything else – in our homes, our bodies, our thoughts and fixations, in wars, in health challenges, in fear, loss and worry — there are no exceptions. There is space around it, space throughout it, and more space.

Maybe this is what clearing or letting go reveals — the constancy and nurturing emptiness of space.

These are tight times. Personally, I feel gripped more times than I’d like to admit for my children and all children in these insane political times, and our impulse is to hold and brace against it. But I’ve found that there is another way to be with it: To notice the grip without becoming the grip. To feel what’s here without adding what isn’t needed – without the Extra.

The practice can be simple, often forgotten, yet accumulative.

Whether you are at home letting go of a 20-year old unpacked box, or giving away those pants you love but have never worn, or in the chronic mental churning of fear or worry, loss or longing, you can pause and turn your attention inward and quietly ask:

What am I holding that isn’t required?
Where am I adding effort?

And with much gentleness, you can remind yourself to Relax… Soften.

When you let go of things, tension, habits, fixations, what do we experience? What do you open to? Notice how something small is often released, widened, opened.

A box is emptied. A shoulder softens.

Something leaves. Nothing is lost.

A cluttered corner. Replaced by a plant.

So much of our suffering comes from what we hold, often without awareness.

Beneath the habit of Extra, there is a natural ease—a spacious way of being, without effort or contraction.

So, we practice, gently, out of self-respect.

Not by insisting that life be different—but by releasing what we add to it.

By letting the body and mind be with what it is without the weight of the grip.

By trusting Space as refuge, experiencing directly increasing moments of freedom.

A Daily Reflection:

In any ordinary moment—
washing, walking, sitting—

pause, take a breath.

Ask quietly:

What here is needed?
What here is extra?

Gently scan for one place in the body that is holding.

Quietly say: Extra. Soften.

Notice the subtle ways release unfolds.

Continue to practice in this way.