Mental Thrifting For the New Year
Mental Thrifting
Just like everything, we follow a cycle of “seasons” in our life Just like there is a pattern, a rotation, a system in everything in the universe: sun sets, moon rises; planets rotate and revolve, seasons flow from one to the next; there is a pattern within us as well.
This is not new information as psychologists and theologists have been studying this for centuries starting with star gazers and astrologers. Even the theory of the IChing is that there is a season for all things. That you can chart where you will be moving into and understand where you are now based on this exact following of a system of underlying energy.
So there is no secret that there is a new life, building, cleansing/changing/transformation, death , and renew/refresh, and renew schedule that is innate in us as humans just as it is in the world, the earth, the universe. This does not mean that life is dictated for us, but that we can better understand what we’re working with, where we are, and how to respond in the current place in which we find ourselves.
Let’s move the season of this article which involves the transformation portion of the cycle.
Isn’t it a great feeling when you get the ambition to clean your house, removed things you’ve outgrown or are no longer useable for you? It’s energizing, you get to reminisce but even more importantly you don’t look at the item with regret, you are just happy to get it out of your space! You are happy to remove the dust, cleanse the debris, clear your space. And the reasons are exciting, because it initiates excitement for new things that might take it’s place.
Many people fear this natural and innate time and push against it. You know them they can’t seem to get rid of anything in their homes and still have everything they ever had from years ago. These people are definitely afraid of change. They want to keep things the way they are and are scared to move forward. But the major problem with this is that they aren’t freeing up energy, space, or excitement to welcome new things into their life. You know them, they’ve had multiple relationships, multiple divorces, can’t retain friends, etc.
It is a natural normal, even innate trait in life to go through all of the seasons , the cycles of life. To deny them is like trying to stop the sun from setting.
I watched a Sesame Street cartoon once where it was Christmas everyday. Now Christmas is something most of us look forward to and have pleasant feelings of warmth over. However, in this episode, it showed that something can be good, but when you try to keep it the same, day after day it eventually becomes problematic. For example, the joy became work. Industry at Hooper’s store changed and they couldn’t keep up with the demand for the typical Christmas goodies and all other sales stopped, meaning many jobs became obsolete. Imagine, if this were true, you would never have new birth, or at least the new birds that would be born would be born into cold and wouldn’t survive or would at the very least be very sick.
It is important to allow the seasons of change to happen and allow flow to move through us.
I am not sure, however, why if this were true in all things in nature, do we not apply the same lessons to our internal states of thought and emotion? Would we not also need to follow the cycle of the seasons within us as well as outside of us?
Just like you get the urge repeatedly throughout the year to purge your house, clean, and get rid of items you can’t use anymore it would make sense, wouldn’t it, to purge your mind, spirit, and emotions of the same?
In my experience with clients over the years, it seems that we highly and intensely personalize our thoughts and emotions. That we seem to see them as “us”, that they are a part of us, or even more so, that they define who we are. And so we hold them tight to us, not wanting to let go. However, remember the lesson of Christmas on Sesame Street. If we do this, we are incapacitating other areas of our bodies, psyches, and lives from discovering and experiencing joys that comes with the changing of the seasons. We are sabotaging our abilities to create something new and thus sit in the same struggles year after year.
Here’s a trick…it’s rather long term, but highly priceless: keep a daily journal. Go back to where you were a year ago. Won’t it be a shame to see that you are in the same place as you were a year ago? Complaining of the same things? Feeling the same way?
There is much in side of our minds that become useless to us once they’ve served their purpose. So just like it’s time to take a few boxes to Goodwill, it is also time to do some “mental and emotional thrifting” periodicially as well.
When you do so, you are creating space for new, which means anticipation, excitement and joy. You are also releasing old concepts that keep you in a state of despair, and depression. Plus, you get to be the master over your mind and emotions. Rather than letting them rule you and dictate your life, you get to determine what you want your life to look like.
Time to take a look inside yourself and go to the thrift store.
Here’s how:
Look around you. Do you like what you see? What would you change? What activities, thoughts, and emotions have been prevailing in your life? Are you happy about that? What would you like to change? How would you like to feel instead? Lovingly send thesed thoughts and emotions off. See them as useful when you needed them, but see them as that old shirt that doesn’t fit you anymore, or that coffeepot with the broken handle. They aren’t useful to you any longer and neither are these old concepts, thoughts, and emotions. And don’t worry about being “wasteful”. Lovingly let them go back where they can be put to good use again. Goodwill re-sells your old stuff and they go to people that need them and can make use of them, as well as sending money to charities where they really need it! In my opinion, we should purge to the thrift store more! Think of the value you will receive by allowing yourself to be a mental and emotional philanthropist. Because when you release old energies from within, it goes back into the ether where it can be transformed and turned back into useful energy! I always tell clients that when they release a vibrational thought or emotion that’s not working for them any longer, they are not only helping themselves, but they are raising the vibration of that thought/emotion ACROSS THE BOARD! Meaning, that everyone that has ever been there will also be helped in healing. Plus, as you feel better, you will ACT better, which means you are raising the vibration of mass consciousness. You are a mental and emotional philanthropist! Yay you! What else can we get out and heal from, especially if it means it will raise the vibration of the whole world?!
What will make this next year the best one yet? Write these ideas down.
Plan for them to happen in your year. Put them in your calendar, and back it off to see what you need to do each month and week to move them forward.
Now, on a separate piece of paper, write down the characteristics of the person that makes these ideas of yours possible. Start planning them in your life. Carry around quotes or mantras or aspirations that have the characteristics written on them so that where you would typically resort back to old thinking, you instead train yourself into the new thinking.
Start being, acting, and living the person whose ideas come true. Start being the character of the person that is successful in these endeavors.
I didn’t say it would be easy, but it’s not impossible. Particularly if you are intent on having a life of joy!
See you at the thrift store! Happy thrifting!