Welcome to day 9 of your #CreatingJoyChallenge !
Today we are going to detox our lives by getting rid of things in our home and/or life that are no longer serving us. This is more than just decluttering and dejunking. Literally when you clean out your stuff, you clean up your life. Creating more space in your home opens you up to feel more peaceful, more clear, more open to inspiration and overall more open to joy in your life.
There is seriously an art to this and its even becoming widely popular. Many people these days are practicing Minimalism which is the art of living with less, living with a minimal amount stuff – only the basic necessities. There are extremes to this and I understand that living a minimalistic lifestyle isn’t necessarily for everyone. But the basic principles of living with less or only the things that truly make you happy can truly bring more richness into your life.
Here’s an example:
Take your closet for example. I’m almost willing to bet that your closet, right now, is filled with a variety of clothes, some you really like and some you don’t. Most people hold onto clothes for just in case purposes or other obligations… “Well, I might wear this someday…”, “I used to really like this shirt…”, “but my mom got this shirt for me..” Excuses like these are very common for why people hold onto things that no longer serves them.
When you go through your closet, how long does it take you to go through your clothes and decide what you want to wear? Is there a big section of clothes that you skip over every day?
Go through your closet and take a look at each shirt, hold it up and ask yourself a few questions:
- How long has it been since I last wore this shirt?
- Does it SPARK JOY in me when I look at it or when I wear it? Do I LOVE it? Does it really make me happy?
- Does it reflect who I am and do I feel good, confident and alive when I wear it?
These questions will help you know if you should get rid of something or not. It is so much better to have 10-20 shirts you ABSOLUTELY LOVE then to have 50-100 shirts made up mostly of shirts you only kinda like… The things that you don’t love, will literally dilute your closet so much you will literally FEEL like you have NOTHING to wear, even if there are things in your closet that you really do love. If you have only the 10-20 shirts that you do love, then every time you look in your closet you will feel abundant, happy and positive.
Believe me, it may be SO uncomfortable to start throwing away your stuff, maybe even painful for some of you, but you will feel so relieved and alive when you get rid of the stuff in your life that isn’t serving you.
Okay, it’s YOUR TURN 🙂
You can do this same activity in any room or area of your house. As you go through your things, use the same questions as above.
How often do you use this? Does it truly SPARK JOY in you? When you look at it, does it add to or take away from your energy? Does it reflect who you are? Does it add to or detract from the positive atmosphere of your home?
Pick one area of your house that needs to be organized or cleaned out.
- Kitchen drawers
- Pantry
- Bathroom closet
- Bedroom closet
- Office
- etc.
TIPS:
- Start on something that motivates you! I recommend starting with your closet, but if there is another area of your house that is more important to you to take care of then go ahead and tackle that first.
- Be sure to start with something that is not too overwhelming. It is better to have multiple small victories than to start a HUGE project and then feel like a failure when you don’t complete it.
- Set aside a set amount of time and complete it. Most people tend to fill the space they have with what they are working on. If you start a project and just plan to finish when you finish it will likely take you along time to complete it. If you give yourself 1 hour to complete something, you will move more quickly and more efficiently and likely get done or very close to done within that allotted 1 hour time period.
Have fun with this! You will get better and better as you become more and more aware of how your stuff influences you and makes you feel. Please share your experience with this in a comment below!