This is the time of year to declutter your life (if you have not already done so in preparation for the new year). The scope of decluttering is wide – it includes people, issues, and things that are no longer serving you well. Until you get this clutter out of your life, you will not be moving forward at a discernable pace!
The peopling issue may be larger than you think. People who act as negative energy in our lives bring our energy down, and cause us to lose self-esteem. They are the little voices in our heads that tell us we are not pretty enough, not good enough, not smart enough. If you have one or more of these people n your life, you need to start taking responsibility for yourself. Set out your sacred boundaries – what you will accept, and what you will not accept, and communicate these to the other person (or people). Choose how you react to them – do not feed into their story. If they are unwilling to work on then you have the option of either limiting your contact with them, or taking them out of your life completely. Put yourself first, and take the action that is in y our best interest.
Sometimes releasing the “things” in our lives is one of the hardest decisions that we can make, and one of the hardest actions that we can take. Why is this? We have memories attached to the things in our life – they bring out an overwhelming emotional response in us. It is these same memories that can act as a very real deterrent to our moving forward. Or, we may be stuck in the rut of “I may be able to use this some day.” We need to look at why these memories are important to us, and then lovingly release them. We can keep them with us through pictures, through videos, through journaling – whatever method works best for us. But when we can release something, when we are ready to release it, we need to do that.
Work slowly in decluttering the “things” of your life. Set aside a specific amount of time each week, and do one room at a time. Bring in boxes and/or strong plastic bags, and label them: Trash, Keep, Donate, Recycle, Repair (unless you are going to donate something “as is”), and Maybe. Te most important slot here could well be the “maybe” slot. This is for items that you are not sure if you want to keep, donate, or throw away.
Decluttering issues from your life is a process, and if you look at it that way, it will be easier to do. Identify the issues that you feel are either holding you back, or just do not belong to you. If they do not belong to you, hand them back to the person responsible for them. Enabling their life at the expense of your is not worth it. For the remaining issues, define why they are important to you. Is the agenda yours, or someone else’s? How does it fit into your life path, and the goals that you have set for yourself? How you react to an issue may be more important than the issue itself. Issues in our lives only carry the level of importance that we give them. Place your energy wisely.
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