How To Energetically Declutter Your Life So You Can Bring In The Good Juju

Many of you may be familiar with Spring Cleaning.

You may also know about the kind of cleaning that you do when you’re up at 1:30am with nothing better to do than sit uncomfortably with your nervous thoughts about the next day’s big meeting/performance/date/event, and you might as well scrub that entire stove that’s been crusting over for a month, along with the kitchen walls, kind of cleaning! (Can you tell I’ve been there?)

And, then there’s the OTHER kind of cleaning that you do when old energy from your ex-boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse/friend/job or an old trauma is still lingering somewhere in your home and needs to be exorcised.

Yes, gurl, THAT kind of cleaning.

You don’t need to be in the woo to know that all objects carry meaning – an old cork from a champagne bottle opened 7 years ago on New Year’s Eve, a card given to you by a long lost love from a year you can’t even remember because it’s been so long ago now, a piece of clothing you wore to that special gala, or that paper invitation or piece of correspondence you’d kept as a momento from a day you never want to forget, for better or for worse.

It’s why some people hoard, why we sometimes like to accumulate stuff, and why visiting those old memories are too painful to remember and bring up. Thus, we get attached to the debris of our existence.

When it comes to energetic decluttering, you are not simply throwing out the trash.

It can be a mindfulness ritual unto itself – a sacred acknowledgment of where you’ve been, how far you’ve come, remembering joys, and releasing sorrows.

If we aren’t careful, we will allow ourselves to hoard physical objects, thoughts, feelings, patterns, and emotions, keeping a place for all of them tucked away somewhere, as if they will keep us safe somewhere down the road.

But, hoarding all that shit never keeps us safe. Or happy.

It just keeps us stuck.

And, then we wonder why we’re endlessly looking for love in the wrong places, why we can’t find the job lead we want, why our dream career remains elusive, why we’re still carrying anger or hurt about something that happens eons ago, or why our abundance has run dry.

One of my dear patients, who ended up moving to California to follow her dreams, would come into my treatment room and admit that getting rid of some of the belongings she’d accumulated during her years in New York City was particularly difficult for her during her packing process to move cross country.

This was made especially more traumatic since she’d just broken up with her boyfriend, and sifting through their shared belongings was particularly painful.

But, as heart-wrenching as it was to go through those things, she was able to remember, with joy, some of the happier times, and mourned others where she felt dishonored and her voice unheard.

She brought mindfulness into the process, and was able to release with a sense of peace, in her own way.

Whether you’re moving cross country, clearing up space to make room for new furniture, having an unwanted visitor, or it’s just time to declutter, decluttering energetically can work wonders on your being – not only physically and mentally, but spiritually and energetically.

Here are my top 5 tips to energetically declutter your life so you can bring in the good juju!

1. Start with conventional means. Break out the vacuum, duster, wet swiffer, and trash can! Clearing our energetic space does indeed start with clearing out our physical space. When you vacuum or sweep, make sure to get under things where dust bunnies are hiding. Not solely to get the remnants of dirt and debris, but because even debris holds onto energy. This is particularly important if you are trying to remove unwanted energies from your home. Believe it or not, unwanted presences tend to cling to stagnant and undisturbed areas that are not well kept, such as corners and areas that are rarely dusted. I talk a little bit about the importance of cleaning when it comes to clearing out undesirable visitors in my previous post, “How To Clear The Energy In Your Living Space“. When it comes to exorcising a space, cleaning it is always the first step!
2. Remove obstacles in your living space. Is there a piece of furniture that sticks out and almost impales you every time you go to your bathroom? Or, is there a joyful piece of glass sculpture on your floor that is too easily accessible to your hunkering hipster boots, ready to burst into shards at a moment’s tap? Part of clearing out our way energetically is to make our path – at home and in life – as flowing as possible. This is partly a Feng Shui concept, one of the Five Pillars of Traditional Chinese Medicine, where you are promoting free flow and harmony in your environment through your living space (the other Four Pillars are: Acupuncture & Moxibustion, Nutrition & Chinese Herbal Medicine, Exercise & Meditation, and Physical Manipulation [such as Tui Na/Chinese Medical massage]). Clear your path, figuratively and literally!
3. Be mindful about how you let go. You have kept every object in your house for a reason. Allow yourself to acknowledge these objects – what they’ve meant to you, what/who they remind you of, the lesson you’d learned, the joy or pain they are associated with. Be proud of your growth since that time. Even if it reminds you of an unhappy moment. If it no longer brings you joy, thank it and either throw it out (if it can’t be repurposed), donate it, or sell it. If a particularly painful memory is associated with the object, and if it’s small enough, burn it in a well ventilated spot on a fireproof container, and give it up as an offering to the Uni-verse, allowing the energy of that object to release and transform into something useful to someone else (the Uni-verse is a master at repurposing energy). When you release with mindfulness, you give clear intention that you are releasing what no longer serves you, because you are now ready to receive all that does.
4. Sage like a mofo. After you’ve cleared out the clutter on physical and intentional levels, leaving no dirt monsters behind (even in the wee spaces they can hide), you’ve cleared the path in your living space, and you’ve removed unwanted objects from your space with mindfulness, now it’s time to burn some sacred White Sage, and call in your Spirit Guides, Angels, and Ancestors to bless your space. Start at your door, calling them in, and continuing in a clockwise direction in your house, blasting everything along the way with White Sage smoke. This process is called smudging. I love using my feather wand to help waft the smoke more easily throughout my living space! Make sure to tap any ash from the sage bundle every so often into your fireproof container (I like to use a shell as my container, since I like to keep it all natural, y’all!) Call in your Team of Light, asking the Light to bless your door, your kitchen, your living room, your table, etc. If you can reach them, smudge any holes in the wall, such as vents or light sockets. Continue in this clockwise direction until you get back to the front door. Then thank your Team of Light for blessing your space.
5. Tap into your Intuition and assess the cleanliness of your home. After your done doing all of that physical and energetic cleaning, stand or sit in a central spot in your living area. See how it feels now. Does it feel clean? If you regularly have unwanted visitors, does it feel more like it’s just You and only You in that space now? Allow your internal Wisdom radar to sweep through your home, and assess how it feels now. If it feels clear, then it’s clear. If you feel like something is lingering, at least you’ve done the foundational clearing work, and can now more easily locate where the unwanted juju is lurking. If you find the spot where that is the case, time to break out the palo santo, call in the Light to radiate into that area, and state that only those of Light are allowed to be there, and that those that are not must leave. It’s YOUR home, time to stake your claim!

What’s your favorite way to energetically declutter?
I’d love to hear about it in the comments, below!

Here’s to radiant juju!

 

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