Burn The Fancy Candles

Are you a candle saver? Do you own beautiful, fancy candles, but never burn them? Me too, and this post is for us.

I love candles, but have always kept my candle purchases very basic: ivory tapers, ivory tea lights, and my favorite bedtime candle. I burn all of these because I know they are basic and easy to replace. But fancy candles? I hesitate to burn them.

I own a few fancy candles…a pair of glittered, peppermint twist tapers. A beautiful pine cone. A lovely group of beeswax tapers, carefully rolled and perfectly crafted.

I have a challenge for us. Let’s burn the fancy candles.

Candles are not meant to be kept, they are meant to be enjoyed. To be lit and willow down until their wax is consumed and their wick left stubby. To keep a fancy candle unburned is to withhold the joy and beauty it can provide. For me, choosing not to burn a fancy candle comes from a scarcity mindset best summarized in one fear-based question: What if I never own another fancy candle?

To type it in black and white sounds silly. Of course I will have other fancy candles! They are literally in every store, mine for the purchasing! But the feeling behind that sentence is real, and it is keeping me from taking action. Naming the honest thing under the surface, although silly, brings to light the way I feel the need to hold on to something for fear there will never be another one.

As an act of delight, of pushing back against the fear of scarcity, of choosing to enjoy the fullness of a gift, I have started burning fancy candles. The pine cone with flecks of sparkly shimmer. The pink twirly taper. The golden orb. And you know what? It’s fun! It’s beautiful! It reminds me how holding on to an item for fear of losing it places too much value in that item. A candle is only wax and twine…it holds nothing of eternal merit or significance. So light the fancy candle, enjoy the glow, and revel in the beauty of letting go.

FANCY CANDLES