September always brings on a sense of newness for me- a new season, a new school year, a chance to start fresh once again. There’s something about that chill in the air that brings back a flood of emotions and memories and somehow it seems to involve quite a complex mixture of sadness for the loss of Summer, but excitement for all that lies ahead.
This month’s challenge is about letting go in order to create space for something new and beautiful. It involves letting go of one thing a day that no longer serves you. This of course can be physical items as well as emotional; because both are significant.
When I was growing up, we always had a room or two packed with boxes that were full of random things- papers, bills, old Christmas cards, broken toys, worn clothes, scratched CD’s and dead batteries…you name it! A lot of times, when we would “clean,” it meant that we would pick up everything that was out of place around the house and then we’d put it in this room and close the door so no one could see it. Maybe a lot of people do this, or maybe I’m just hoping that I’m not the only one that has done that before. The thing about it though is that once the door is closed, those things are still there; and for me, it just feels cluttered and messy and feels very unsatisfying.
Although, while living in New York there were no empty or extra rooms to dump anything into. So, truthfully, this helped me a lot in decluttering and in holding on to only those things that were most precious to me. In some ways, we had no choice I guess. The small one bedroom apartment required us to be selective about what we kept and stored away, and that definitely made it a little easier to stay organized.
This month, we will be challenging ourselves to let go. This might mean letting go of those old cassette tapes that I’ve been holding on to, or it could also mean that I will be writing in my journal more often so as to purge the thoughts that are plaguing my heart and mind with worries and fears that are not currently serving me at the moment.
Today, I am starting with the physical items. I have a huge stack of mail I need to go through, and then I’ll work my way on over to some boxes that I have still yet to unpack from our move out west (I’m determined to have them unpacked before we hit our one year mark on October 1st!). I’m so excited to have this as a goal because I truly love the feeling of purging. I love making space for new and beautiful things. I love the cleansing feeling of letting go, even though it can be difficult and even painful to do at first.
If you want to take part in this challenge as well, we would so much enjoy hearing from you about your experiences as well! Cristi will be sharing some of her thoughts and insights in the near future about letting go of “emotional clutter,” and we also have a professional organizer who has offered to share some tips with us about getting and staying organized. So stay tuned! Until then, I hope everyone is buying school supplies and smelling bouquets of newly sharpened pencils.
Xo,
Meet the Author: Bianca Merkley