Mental Clutter

Whether we realize it or not, the things we choose to surround ourselves with undoubtedly have an impact on our mental state. The goal is to keep things in our possession that elicit positive emotions, not negative memories or difficult times. Sometimes, even if something holds sentimental value, it might not be worth holding on to because of the memories that it evokes. In short: if it doesn't make you feel good, get rid of it.

A few days ago, a friend passed along a link to life coach (I love life coaches!) Gail Blanke’s book, “Throw Out Fifty Things”. One of the exercises that she suggests is to write down everything that you're throwing away, but also attach a descriptor to each thing like, “high-school identity crisis outfit” (obviously this one is from my personal collection), or “relic from an old relationship”, that allows you to see the emotional aspect of what you’re throwing away as well. I think this is a great idea and going forward I’m going to incorporate this exercise into my challenge. It’ll be really revealing to look back at the end of the month and see all of the negative emotions and outdated memories that I’m putting behind me in addition to their physical counterparts.