In the past 90 days I've decluttered toxins and excess pounds from my person and emotional 'goo' from my head. Now I am turning my attention to detoxing my surroundings. Yes, it is time to massively declutter my house!
I've heard other raw foodies mention in passing, that quite often as you simplify the food you put in your body, you suddenly gain the urge to simplify what is surrounding your body. Kind of a side benefit to going raw, if you will. This can not only be in your external environment, but also a desire to declutter your relationships, your schedule, your job, your hobbies, the town you live in (i.e. moving), etc. Yes, people often make radical life changes after they 'go raw'. Blame it on the clarity and focus. Suddenly you are awake for your own life, and if you don't like what you see, you might just have the gumption to change it.
I don't see doing anything more radical than cleaning my closets so I can open them without sustaining a life threatening injury. Call me kooky...
I moved pretty often as a kid. For this reason, I have this twisted love for the adventure of moving! Now that I'm grown up, I also love moving because it forces you to handle every single thing you own and ask the 'big' questions:
- Do I love you?
- Have I used you in the past year?
- Do I have more than one of you?
- Am I keeping you for sentimental reasons only?
- Are you really trash? OR
- Could you bless somebody else's house instead of mine?
The sentimental question is one that gets me. I once heard the dude on one of those cleaning shows make the point, "When you get rid of an (sentimental) item, you are not getting rid of the person who gave it to you." Get rid of it, he went on, or for pete sake give it a place of prominence in your home. Give it the honor it deserves. Ouch.
Okay, so I'm not moving (that I know of), but I do have a plan to act like I am. Hey, I'm moving towards simplicity, right? :-) I want to go room by room and spend 15 minutes a day decluttering in that room every day until it is done. My closets will take me way longer than 15 minutes, but it's a start. Taking the room top to bottom and left to right, I plan to sift through my stuff with a trash baggie and a box for Goodwill at the ready for things to be deposited into. I plan to take the half full Goodwill boxes I already have lying about TO Goodwill. It's a radical notion, I know!
This blog would not truly be a full representation of me if I didn't mention my beloved Flylady.
House keeping has been a challenge for me, mostly because I turn into a martyr of epic proportions. Flylady has been a tremendous mentor ever since I learned about her after my second baby was born in 2000. We daily have people in and out of our home for various lengths of time, and utilizing her methods has helped me enjoy life more because I don't have to stress out about how my house looks. (Now, I don't always succeed at this, as my husband will attest! I'm in process.) She's given me handles on what to do, permission to be ME and encouraged me to not be a perfectionistic shrew.
I am not great at house keeping, and certainly not at decluttering (as my house will attest), but I am in the process of FLYING...finally learning to love myself through choosing to do things that feed me...raw food on the inside, simplifying life on the outside.
Your spot on about the clutter thing. It shows in so many ways, how thnigs are flowing for people. A cluttered home, the messy cluttered work desk, the car, etc. It's not just clutter for me, I find that leaving stacks of bills and late notices laying around the house just zaps my intuition and spirituality. Nothing blocks me quicker than worrying about bills, collections, etc. For so long I used to carry by bills etc. to work with me in a bag, with plans to "go through them" on my lunch break. Carrying all this negative energy everywher with me was just killing me! I finally left the baggage home, but now I have to make sure I put it somewhere, not always out in plain sight. I got caught up in the (spring) fall cleaning vibe too, and actually swept out my entire house (not vacuum, SWEEP), then went through every room with sage.
Posted by: Isonetea | 06/07/2012 at 01:47 PM