Decluttered Life, Decluttered Mind

Hey Guys, Welcome back to Lunar Blogs. I hope you guys are ready for this weeks blog, I am very excited to share this part of my journey with all of you.

"As I am sitting here in Central Park on my day off, Mother Nature blessed us with a beautiful 70 degree weather. It was the first glimpse of spring here in NYC and everyone was ready for it. You can immediately feel the energy of the people change, New Yorkers go from running from Point A to Point B and they just slow down (At least here in Central Park). There are people just strolling and talking it fills my heart with joy. As I am sitting here by myself taking it all in and enjoying every part of it I start to appreciate the simple things in life, just what a simple ray of sun and open space can do for the mind."

- Today was a beautiful day (Via Central Park)

I wanted to share with you guys a big and recently new part of my spiritual journey. This is something that I have been very passionate about and by no means has it been easy. For a few months now I have decided that I was going to "declutter my life" (yup exactly that). I literally have stripped every aspect and thing in my life in search for a more clear head and space to work on myself. I do not know when it all started. It could have been when I watched the "Marie Kondo" series on Netflix, that I know inspired a lot of people to tackle closets and rooms to see if things "Sparked Joy in their life". I also think it was my best friends voice telling me I had a lot of stuff and needed to get rid of "a bunch of crap". I believe his simplicity and minimalism definitely inspired me to go through every part of my life and make a lot of changes for the better (So yes I give you credit).

"Clutter is nothing more than postponed decisions" - Barbara Hemphill

Four Stages Of Decluttering:

- Denial

- Resistance

- Commitment

- Relieve

The process is so scary and refreshing. It consist of essentially stripping down your entire life piece by piece and not only having good but also bad memories come back, whether it was when you are going through pictures on your phone and computer or when you go through that drawer that has not been touched in years. You find old pictures and memoirs like your high school year book, cards friends wrote to you and pictures of ex-boyfriends that make you cringe (throw them out!). The end result afterwards when you tackled a certain space I cannot begin to describe the feeling of gratification and appreciation you get from it. I started this process very hopeful and with just one goal. With out following any rules or guidelines from the internet, I simply wanted to make sure every item that I kept in my life either served a purpose to me on a daily basis or meant a lot to me. With that in mind I started going through my closet and drawers as well as my computer and phone.

1st: The Closet

Starting this I think clothes was one of the hardest parts, even though for years my wardrobe constantly changes and I always either give away or donate the clothes I no longer love. When I decided to really condense my closet I had to go through every piece of clothing I owned and really ask myself if I was going to ever wear that again. I had to be true to myself and give myself the pep talk that with minimum clothing I was able to create the perfect outfits and that was enough. Knowing that I would donate the clothes and someone else was going to enjoy them always kept me motivated. I was now left with one five drawer closet where I only have clothes that I love, I will continue to do this and was very satisfied with the end results.

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2nd: The Junk

Now I call it junk, even though it really is everything else miscellaneous in my life. I also had to tackle the random drawers like face and hair products, stationary drawers (I am that girl with the thousands of pens, markers and highlighters). As a female we tend to accumulate multiples of everything and though guys are better at that than us, not all are so this goes for the guys too.

In this part of the process I used a different approach since a lot of it was items I was emotionally attached to and I will not lie it took longer than I hoped for, it is still in the process as I write this. While decluttering these drawers I looked back on everything Buddhism has taught me, to really look through these items and ask myself if this attachment was holding me back from my end goal in this journey. The entire process of detachment and realizing we struggle in life with not only the BIG things like loss and hurt, but also with the small stuff like items in our life from things in the past or a gift someone gave us. With that I was able to get rid of things I never used and will never need. The process took weeks from taking stuff off the walls and see an empty space, donating, throwing out and reorganizing. At the end their were piles and piles of everything I was letting go and I was able to walk into my room and feel so much space and relieve.

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3rd: The Digital

Finally tackling my computer and phone is something I am constantly decluttering honestly but enjoy the process each time. I have found a system that works for me, one that I can control and where I am not consumed with the amount of technology around me and use my time in a more productive way. Now I know this is not easy for many people, growing up in a generation where technology evolved faster than we did. It is understandable that we feel an attachment to our social media, or everything that the phone and computer provide for us. I am still working on it, I still find myself scrolling through Instagram looking at other people live their lives and be productive and I do not realize it until I am an hour in (sometimes even more, not proud of it). With this process I did look through a variety of videos on Youtube, I do recommend them they have a bunch of different ones and different ideas for everyones lifestyle. At the end of the day we all have different lives and we do what works best for each and every one of us. I believe I found what works for me, I work on it every day and slowly it has become a hobby where I challenge myself to see if I can delete more and more stuff off my phone (can I just go back to a simple flip phone?). I highly encourage anyone to do this and really pay attention how much time you spend on it, what kind of content and people you follow and how much of it really inspires you and helps you become a better YOU.

- My phone

Here are some ideas for decluttering of the phone:

- Turn off all notifications except for text messages and phone calls (emails: teach yourself to go through them every morning with the notifications off and delete Spam as well as Trash)

- Keep a simple background, nothing too distracting and something that brings you peace.

- Delete old text messages as soon as the conversation is over (unless there is something important) as well as call logs and voice mails.

- Keep minimum amount of apps only things you either use on a daily or monthly basis the rest if you ever need it you can always download again (this helps keep the home page clean)

- Last but not least minimize the time you spend on the phone, once you find yourself mindlessly scrolling through things that are not important, close the phone and do something else (maybe pick up a book, or come and read my blogs!)

I know this is not a simple project and not everyone will be interested or have the time to do this. My end goal with all of this was to help my anxiety and make more use out of all the precious moments in life. To appreciate the world around me and not get so consumed with items and people that really serve no great purpose in my life.

I really hope that this blog has helped some of you, and who knows maybe even inspired some of you to do something similar. I would love to know or help anyone with the process, my ears are opened to anyone that wants to learn and I can learn with them as well.

Remember that this life is precious and if we can work together to make a better future, a more conscience future. The world would naively be a better place.

As always guys, see you next time and Stay Positive!

Namaste

(Daisy Gonzalez)