Clutter Busting: Letting Go of What's Holding You Back - Softcover

Palmer, Brooks

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1577316592 ISBN 13: 9781577316596

Verlag: New World Library, 2009

Inhaltsangabe

Piles of junk in garages and closets, overflowing papers on desks, items unused for years, masses of unanswered email, clothing never worn, useless gifts that collect dust — all these things, says Brooks Palmer, come weighted with shame and guilt and have a suffocating effect on spirit and soul. In this insightful book, Palmer shows how to get rid of the things in our lives that no longer serve us. By tossing out these unneeded items, we are also eliminating their negative influences, freeing up energy, and unlocking our potential.

Loaded with inspiring anecdotes and practical tips, Clutter Busting is based on the premise that your things are not sacred, but you are. The book explores such fundamental topics as the false identities we assume through clutter, the fear of change those junk piles represent, the addictive nature of holding on to objects, how clearing clutter makes room for clarity and sweeps away confusion and stasis, and much more. With Brooks’s upbeat and compassionate guidance, you’ll find yourself clearing the way for new and exciting things to come into your life.

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Brooks Palmer uses compassion, awareness, and humor to help clients get rid of clutter. He has been featured in national and local media and offers clutter-busting workshops. Also a stand-up comedian and member of the Screen Actors’ Guild, he lives in Chicago and Los Angeles.

www.clutterbusting.com

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Clutter Busting

Letting Go of What's Holding You Back

By Brooks Palmer

New World Library

Copyright © 2009 Brooks Palmer
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-57731-659-6

Contents

INTRODUCTION, 
CHAPTER ONE You Are Sacred — Your Things Are Not, 
CHAPTER TWO We Assume False Identities in Clutter, 
CHAPTER THREE Clutter Keeps Us Living in the Past, 
CHAPTER FOUR Clutter Represents Fear of Change, 
CHAPTER FIVE Clutter Is an Addiction, 
CHAPTER SIX Clearing Clutter to Make Room for Clarity, 
CHAPTER SEVEN Inner Clutter Creates Outer Clutter, 
CHAPTER EIGHT Mental Clutter, 
CHAPTER NINE Clutter as Punishment, 
CHAPTER TEN Using Your Discriminating Tools, 
EPILOGUE What Really Matters, 
Summary of Clutter-Busting Principles, 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, 
ABOUT THE AUTHOR, 

CHAPTER 1

YOU ARE SACRED —

YOUR THINGS ARE NOT

There is no inherent value in things. Things themselves are neutral, but we ascribe them false value. Things will never make you happy. Nothing, even the most beautiful piece of art, is sacred, except you. When you take care of yourself, you are happy. When you are happy, you don't need anything. You are content. Your life is satisfying. You're not compelled to acquire things to make you happy. You are already enough as you are.

If you are unhappy and you buy something to help you feel better, you are buying into an ad campaign that was designed to part you from your money. You are still unhappy, though temporarily distracted by the thing. When the newness wears off, you feel bad again. This is usually the point at which you acquire something new in an attempt to feel better.

Stop. Add nothing new at this point.

Drop the habit and come back to you. You are enough. You'll see.

Happiness is not an object. It is a subjective state. It is not dependent on things.

Once you start letting go of the clutter that you brought into your home as a distraction, you'll notice yourself becoming very calm. What you were looking for was there all the time — just buried under stuff.

You Need Nothing

You are born with nothing, and you will die with nothing. While you're alive you grasp things hoping they will improve you as a person, give you pleasure, make you win, get you attention. Grasping is a symptom of anxiety — intuitively you know that nothing gives lasting pleasure, that nothing is eternal. You know that things break, lose their luster, or get lost or stolen.

Imagine that you are drowning in the ocean. You are grasping at the objects floating past you to keep afloat. You grasp something, and it slips out of your hand, or you swim toward something and it floats out of your reach. You think it's all over. You are going to sink to the bottom of the ocean and drown. You give up.

But you don't sink. You float. You are able to stay on the surface without anything to assist you. It's a peaceful feeling. You are self-reliant. You don't need anything. You thought you did, but you were wrong. The panic is gone. The anxiety has dissolved. You feel true happiness at just being alive.

This is freedom from clutter. You really don't need anything. It was pure superstition to think otherwise. As you are, you are self-sustaining. This is the place that beauty and joy and love and excitement and adventure emanate from. When you are naturally fulfilled, you can finally enjoy life right now. The neediness that drove you to endlessly acquire and hold on to things was insatiable. Trying to satisfy it through shopping, surface relationships, and misguided attempts at success, manipulation, and control only made you feel worse.

Break the chain of thinking that things will make you happy. When you look closely, you see that they never did or that they gave the illusion of doing so only for a few seconds. Actions based on that hunger only made you even hungrier for more things. The momentum of living that way can be stopped. You can turn it around. When you think about it, it feels impossible. But when you take action, the momentum carries you forward. There's tremendous power in action. Your action, when strongly directed, breaks the inertia of sorrow and depression.

Reading this, you are already turning around. You are changing in a way that is natural to you. Lean in that direction. It will give you what you need. And it will keep giving you that freedom and peace and happiness. Out of habit, the mind may fret about the change. Keep letting go.

Desire

Like all of us, you feel low at times. Maybe you turn to a common solution to help you feel better right away: shopping. It doesn't matter if it's online or at the mall. You felt bad and wanted to cheer yourself up. You remembered all the ads you saw on TV or in magazines in which someone got some product and felt so much better, or you remembered something from your past that cheered you up and you wanted that thing again. You want to be that happy. Now.

But you weren't thinking clearly when you were out buying. So whatever you bought was flawed. It's not going to be something you need. Things do not contain the ingredients to make you happy. If you're feeling bad, maybe you need to reflect on your life, take it easy, and be nicer to yourself. Slowing down and reflecting can help change your state of mind. And it's free! You will not get a Visa card statement for it a month from now. I'm not saying that we can't buy ourselves new shoes if we need them, or that treating ourselves from time to time is not okay. Rather, this is about becoming more deeply aware of what is truly essential in the moment.

Another way to reflect is to think of a time when you absolutely had to possess some object. You felt a rush of excitement just thinking about having it. It was almost painful not to have this thing. When you got it, suddenly there was fulfillment and joy. The joy came not from getting the object but from the relief of letting go of the pain of wanting. When a terrible pain ends, isn't there great joy? This comes from the gratitude for the ceasing of pain.

Watch your experience of wanting something. Really feel it — it's uncomfortable. You feel things will not be okay until you have the item. Then be aware of how you feel when you get the thing. The needing subsides. There is peace of mind. Getting the thing didn't give you joy. The happiness comes from calming your mind. Advertising and misguided memories create your mind-set of wanting and needing. The desire is created through amazingly powerful psychological manipulation. You have been hypnotized into a state of pain, and the antidote is revealed to you: the object for sale. "This object will alleviate your suffering."

But you are complete and happy as you are. The idea of terrible lack was introduced into your awareness by ads and unhappy people — maybe you — and suddenly you felt terribly incomplete and had to resolve it. That's why it's hard to get rid of things: you bought the item thinking it would make you better. If you get rid of it, you think you're losing something that makes you a better person. But that's a mirage. You're doing better than you think.

Only Your Peace of Mind Is Sacred

I'm effective at clutter busting because I believe that nothing is sacred except your happiness and peace of mind.

You come to me with two things: complaints about your life and extreme attachment to your things. You have convinced yourself that...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: New World Library
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2009
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1577316592
• ISBN 13: 9781577316596
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 232
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: New World Library; https://www.newworldlibrary.com; ; 14 Pamaron Way; Novato; CA; 94949; USA
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar