Spring Cleaning 03/04/2010
 
This time of year, I delight in a walk outside after weeks of feeling locked up in the house.  Sure, I can go outside in January, but the arctic air robs me of my breath.  On these first days of mild temperatures, the balmy weather energizes me as I deeply inhale the fresh air, letting it flow into my lungs, gathering energy for the year ahead. If my January walk is an insular challenge for survival, today it is an extroverted celebration of life. Yet as much as I delight in drinking in the clean air as I inhale, it’s really my exhalations that my awareness turns to as I venture outside in early spring.  I find myself exhaling more completely, and each breath flushes the cold winter tension out of my body.  I begin to think about the annual ritual of spring cleaning and to consider the ways I want to prepare my mind and body for the year ahead. 

I am referring to the rite of purification - to cleanse, make new and become free of limiting influences.  Purification is something we can do in small ways every day.  Especially on days when I feel my attention pulled in sixteen different places at once, purifying - removing the unwanted influences - allows me to focus my energy where I want it.   It can be as simple as taking a shower with the intention of not only cleaning my body, but also my mind, spirit and emotions. 

At other times, purification can be a more complex undertaking where I examine the underlying patterns in my life.  A large focus of my medical Qi Gong training elaborates on the practices for purging unwanted energies from a person’s body – emotions, excesses, other’s judgments, etc. under the premise that when these energies get stuck like tension in a person’s shoulders, it impacts a person’s physical and spiritual health.  This mind-body relationship is an important focus of my work as a life coach, so for me today, as I breathe deeply, my process of internal spring cleaning naturally examines how I want to cleanse my emotional patterns and my thinking as I gear up for the year ahead.

People often talk about how our thoughts become our reality.  This sounds sort of abstract until one considers that our habits – the things we do every day – have a direct impact on what we accomplish and how we experience life.   And our thinking has a direct impact on creating our habits. 

For example, last year I had a baby and my sleep was disrupted by late-night feedings.  I was unendurably tired.  I became so exhausted that it became part of my identity.  Beyond the physical manifestation of circles under my eyes, tiredness became part of who I thought I was.  So after weeks of dragging myself around, I created new habits that allowed me to rest during the day.   I developed a fondness for taking an afternoon nap with my baby. 

This was great when I was waking up three times a night to feed the baby.   But now she’s older and sleeping through the night most nights.  So it’s time to revaluate my belief that I am tired, to break the thought pattern, in order to break my siesta habit.  While it was a routine that served me well last year, now I’d rather use that time for something else, like exercise.  Yet if I break the habit without stopping myself from thinking that I’m tired, I’ll just feel run down.  This challenges me to honestly ask myself if I am tired or if I continuing a habit just because I believe I’m tired.  As I checked in with myself, I recognized that my energy actually feels pretty good.  I do not need that nap after all.

These cleansings are also useful not only with seasonal transitions but major life changes such as divorce. At the end of any significant relationship, it’s very important to reassess who you think you are.  Our relationships shape us and being in love can mean you set aside some of your interests or desires to create a life with your partner or perhaps you adopted some their values and behavior into your life.  And while it’s likely that a marriage that ends in divorce may have done so because it wasn’t a good fit or was out of balance, chances are you have embraced or accepted thoughts and beliefs about yourself during your marriage that you could benefit from reevaluating. 

Relationships can be like fun house mirrors, reflecting a distorted image back to the self.  What are the things you believe about yourself that really might only have been true when reflected through the eyes of your former spouse?  How do these beliefs inform your thoughts?  And how do those thoughts affect your habits?

A client of mine, Megan, has a practice as an independent massage therapist. When she married Jake, who had a full-time corporate job, she happily turned her finances over to him.  She contributed financially to the household, but Jake managed the money.  Over the years of their marriage, Jake often said that Melanie, because she only worked part time and had a flexible schedule, was irresponsible about money.  In reality, Melanie made about the same amount of money as he did.  But because he had a corporate job with set hours, dress codes, a corporate travel account, etc. his job was the “responsible one”.   Over time, Melanie took Jake’s belief to be her own.

When they divorced, Megan had an unbalanced monthly budget that resulted in several late car payments.  Megan came to me in an absolute panic, convinced she was  “irresponsibility about money”.   Yet, when Melanie looked back to how she handled her money before marrying Jake, Melanie recounted that she handled her own finances and did pretty well.  She paid her bills on time and put aside money every month.  As she explored her history with money, she realized she had decided to maintain a less than a full-time schedule in order to have a balanced life and pursue her other interests.  This was a personal choice - based on her values - and not a failing.   When Melanie looked at herself through a fun house mirror that reflected Jake’s belief that she was irresponsible about money - one that she accepted - she created bad habits for herself that resulted in financial stress.  Once she challenged herself, she purified herself of this belief and created a budget and a lifestyle that worked for her. 

So I challenge you to spend some time noticing your thoughts one of these invigorating days of spring.  Don’t try to change them - just take note and make an inventory or list of them.  As you do this, notice how these thoughts influence your experience emotionally and intellectually.  Are there thoughts that leave you feeling tired? Unspired?  Uneasy?  Doubtful?  Angry?  How do these thoughts emerge from your beliefs about your self?  And how do they shape your habits?   What would be possible for you if you broke free of these restricting thoughts? 

It’s a worthwhile seasonal undertaking to reassess your life, to update your beliefs and emotions.  And just as you visit your dentist for your annual cleaning and check up around your birthday, use the warm air of springtime to clean out the emotional buildup that is not serving you or blocking you from living the inspired, valued life you know you can live. 
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