Hauling Around Expired Condiments

This week I threw away our last bottle of Olive Garden Salad Dressing (expiration date 2013) and Parmesan cheese (expiration date Aug 2014). Before you are concerned for our health, no we haven't used either since, well, 2012 most likely. These bottles were sitting on the bottom shelf of our fridge door, and I only noticed them because Roc' took it upon himself to lick the cheese container (gross).

It was then when I realized, how many times has the fridge been stocked full and we've rearranged to squeeze in the last bit food? So many times we could have better used the space being held captive by these expired, toxic (read: full of allergens) items! It's as though I got used to them being there that I never truly SAW them. One just expects those items to hang out in the fridge, ya know? I think it was earlier this year when I went through all of the condiments and realized they were expired, too, because we just don't use them since going allergy-free. (side note: WHY did I miss these 2 condiments the first time around? Did I really just miss them, or did I not want to part with them yet, like maybe I'd actually use them in the future?!)

Where am I going?

How much crap do we all carry around in our lives because we just expect it to be there and don't truly notice it anymore? Like condiments in a fridge (mayo, mustard, ranch dressing), we just expect to see them and get used to their presence, whether or not we actively engage them. Negative thoughts about ourselves or others have taken occupancy and rob us of filling that space with healthy, positive thoughts. We haul around critics and harmful relationships, carry others' burdens and stresses, self-doubts and worries about our futures; there are mistakes, failures, times of shame or embarrassment, others' judgement of us (or maybe our own judgments of others) we just can't shake. We fill our life fridge with junk, expired junk. And times have changed but we hold onto these views, because they are comforting? Because we are just used to them being there? Because we know they hurt to confront them, so we've stopped looking at that part of our life.

It's time. It's time to confront these negative attitudes, thoughts, relationships. Purge or change them. Make room for happiness, new memories, and love. Take a look in the mirror and see the masterpiece, a masterpiece without expired, toxins. YOU.

Also, consider this a PSA to check all expiration dates on your condiments, especially the ones you don't currently use...

-RR

"As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."

- Ephesians 2:1-10 NIV