Thrifting can net all sorts of treasures. Shoppers can snatch up everything from vintage clothes to mid-century modern furniture to kitschy knick-knacks, all without breaking the bank.
But for one grieving woman, she found a hidden gem that was truly priceless.
Unexpected Thrift Store Find
Photo of a little girl with her father and a black purse.
TikTok/Abrielle Clausing
On January 13, 2021, Abrielle Clausing's world fell apart. Her father unexpectedly passed away from Covid-19. As anyone who has experienced grief knows, the journey isn't a straight one. It ebbs and flows with some days being significantly harder than others.
It was during a "particularly hard grief week" when Abrielle, 24, decided to embark on some retail therapy. She used to love thrifting with her dad, and no one loved a good deal more than he did.
However, she didn't just want to shop for the sake of shopping, she had a very specific item she wanted in mind.
"My sister and I decided to go thrifting and I told her I wanted to find a vintage Fossil brand purse," she explains in a now-viral TikTok video.
And wouldn't you know, Abrielle did indeed end up finding "the cutest vintage Fossil brand purse" - seriously what are the chances?
And as if that wasn't serendipitous enough, it was about to get a whole lot more remarkable.
Inside the purse was a handwritten note:
"When you read this you will be far from me in miles but not in my heart. I'm here. I love you."
Whelp.
She immediately took it as a sign from her beloved dad.
"I knew it was from him," she told People. "I always check the inside of the bag before I buy it to make sure it’s in good condition. When I stuck my hand in it, I felt the piece of paper and when I took it out and found the note, I read it out loud to my sister."
"When I saw the note, it just confirmed that he was with us," she added. "He’s always with us."
Response To The Viral TikTok
TikTok · abrielleclausingAbrielle's heartwarming video has garnered nearly one million views and over 1,000 comments and it's making believers out of every single one of us.
"I'm so afraid that death is final and we just stop existing. But some things can't be explained. There has to be more out there!!"
"This was def him 🥹💙"
"I’m literally crying so hard. Someone would have had to carry me out of the thrift 😭"
"I'm honestly at a loss for words. Wow. Just wow."
Even Fossil weighed in, writing, "What a beautiful note to find. Your dad's love will always be with you. Sending you and your family a big, warm hug."
Her TikTok also opened the floodgates for others to share the signs they've received from lost loved ones.
"My brother passed away & years later I was at a checkout line in the store & at the cash register was a young school photo of him that someone left.... never made sense but I'll never forget it."
"About 30 seconds after bursting in tears thinking about my grandpa a car merged in front of me and the license plate was his name and his age when he died 😭😭"
"When my mom passed, days after I found an email that not me nor my sister had opened or read before. It was an email my mom sent us 4 years before with the message “open it when I’m gone, love, mom”. It had a beautiful letter as an attachment."
Love Lives On
The note Abrielle Clausing found in a Fossil bag while thrifting is now part of a cherished collage.
People.com/Abrielle Clausing
Abrielle has given the note a place of honor, right smack in the middle of a framed collage of her favorite sayings and things.
It's a beautiful reminder that the love she shared with her dad lives on, even though he is gone.
And whether you believe in fate or not, you have to admit the universe had an uncanny way of showing up just when she needed it to.
After all, what are the odds that a stranger penned a note with the exact words she needed to hear, placed it in the exact bag she was looking for, AND that bag ended up in the exact thrift store she was shopping in? Pretty astronomical.
And yet, here we are.
Life is full of unexpected, magical moments that often happen when we least expect it. And sometimes those moments bring us the comfort and connection we need most, reminding us that love...is never truly lost.
For a Happier and Healthier Life, Stop Judging Others
"I have nothing personal against her, but I think she is quite unprofessional."
That’s how I used to feel about an ex-colleague. And I wasn’t the only one. I was surrounded by people who thought the same. We were irritated by the way this girl used to work according to her own rules, yet get promoted before any of us.
When I think of it now, I think I wasted my time and energy. Why? Well, has judging her altered my life positively? If it has, I can’t recall any of these changes. I can only recall that it made me angry, irritated, and jealous. It disturbed my focus. It took my peace away. And I know that had I had put all that energy on my own work, I would have done better at my job.
For a Happier and Healthier Life, Stop Judging Others
Judging others, especially for things that do not concern you, only ever makes things worse. But how to avoid it? For many of us, judging is ingrained in our system. We judge everyone, from a stranger in the street, to a co-worker, to our political leaders, and usually without having all the information.
It's admittedly not easy to suppress the urge. But if I show you how it unsettles your life, you will be more determined to flush it out of your system once and for all.
Judging others makes you lose friends
What do you look for in a good friend?
Compassion. Understanding. Support.
But your readiness to judge leads to the opposite of all these things.
I once dated a guy who my best friend thought wasn't a good match for me. Whenever I would talk to her about him, she would subconsciously look for the negative. Eventually, I didn’t feel like sharing anything about him with her anymore, because I knew that if I told her how happy I was, she wouldn't share in my joy. And if I told her about a little fight we'd had, she would find all the reasons in the world to try to pit me against him.
The fact was that she never tried to know more about him. She never asked any questions. She never showed any interest. And yet, she felt she had the right to judge!
This could be any of us. We judge without even thinking sometimes. And this eagerness to cast judgement builds a nasty wall between friends.
When you judge others, you can't learn from them
Judgement is often derived from jealousy. We judge to console our mind that the person we see as competition is worse, or at least no better than us.
You might have a work colleague who is a favorite with the boss. You know they work hard. You know they deserve the attention. You might accept that. But you might still look for their flaws, and try to find the areas where you're better than them.
"She dresses like a geek. She is a bore. She has no social life."
But is that good for you?
Or is it better to acknowledge her strengths, and learn from her? You might be better at some things. But she is definitely better at others. So stop comparing yourself to others. You won’t gain any points for proving you are better than someone, but you can better your life by learning from others.
When you judge, you are less open to new experiences
Our opinions are often based on our past experiences. We tend to believe that what worked for us must work for others, just as what proved wrong for us must also prove the same for others. The problem is that after a few experiences, people believe they know it all and have earned the right to judge.
There is this phenomena called the Dunning-Kruger effect, where a person develops an illusory superiority in their mind. They become overconfident about their abilities and think lowly of others. The person who behaves this way is defined as cognitively biased and is considered to possess lower abilities.
Sure, your experiences equip you to offer sensible advice. You might have learned valuable lessons from them. But there are billions of people in the world, all with different experiences. And while there might be some commonalities, every experience is somewhat individual-specific.
The important part is to be humble. Think about this: if you have learnt so much from your own experiences, imagine how much more you can learn from others’?
Judging others damages your health and happiness
Still not convinced? Check this out: A study out of the University of Nebraska supported the belief that negative perceptions of others can boost narcissism and antisocial behavior. Wood said, "The simple tendency to see people negatively indicates a greater likelihood of depression and various personality disorders."
Then just why must you?
I know it's hard to shut down the negative voices all at once. As I said earlier, the instinct to judge is ingrained in our system. Chucking it at once is unrealistic.
So, go slowly. Make it a point to think at least once before forming an opinion of someone. Learn more about your own emotional patterns. Just don’t give up. Before you know it, you'll have stopped the toxic habit in its tracks. And you'll be a jolly positive person because of it!