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articles about and by Carol Olmstead
Clutter Clearing For the New Year
January is “Get Organized Month,” and one great way to start the year with some positive Feng Shui is to create lots of room for good things to flow into your life. In Feng Shui, we say that “nothing new flows into your life until you make room for it,” so when you remove clutter you open up a space for the positive energy to flow. Here are four of my favorite clutter-clearing strategies for the New Year, or for any time you want to make room to attract wealth, harmony, and love.
1. De-Clutter Your Shoe Collection. A good first step into the new year is to clear your shoe clutter. American women keep an estimated 2.9 billion pairs of shoes in their closets. In Feng Shui, when your closets are cluttered with shoes you don't wear, it symbolizes the inability to step forward in your life. This goes for the men and children in your family as well. If you're not wearing all of your shoes, clear them out of your closet and donate them to community charities like Soles4Souls, a nonprofit that distributes gently-worn footwear to more than 300 million children and 1.5 billion adults worldwide.
2. Clear Hobby Clutter. Another way to clear clutter at the beginning of the year is to get rid of supplies from hobbies that no longer interest you. Call up friends with the same hobby and let them take what they want, or sell the supplies on a website whose community is dedicated to the hobby. You could call local stores that sell your supplies to see if they will sell your used supplies on consignment, or if they can identify clubs that could use the supplies. You can also locate nonprofits and/or schools that teach the hobby to see if they will buy the supplies at a discount, or take free supplies off your hands. And of course, you can always sell your supplies on sites like eBay or Craigslist, or recycle them via Freecycle.org.
3. Reduce Your Computer Clutter. Computer clutter is just as much of a Feng Shui issue as clutter anywhere else in your home and office because it slows you down and keeps you from moving forward. First, clear some of the icons from your computer desktop, because clutter there has the same negative effect on your career as a messy desk, blocking productivity and success. Next, clear your operating system by backing up your data and update your operating system with the built-in utilities or an external tool to fix common problems and reduce demands on your system. You can also remove files you don't need from your main hard drive and store them on a separate drive. Purge some things you have saved on other storage media, especially floppy disks, because you probably don't have access to anything that can actually read them. Finally, wipe down your monitors, clear out vents, and clean your keyboard and mouse, because the simple act of removing dust can extend your computer's life.
4. Get Rid of Your “Guilt" Clutter. You know what "guilt clutter" is, it's the guilt over getting rid of gifts that came from someone special, objects that cost you a lot of money, or items you bought but don’t like or need. Your guilt-inducing items might include such things as the wool scarf from mom that you can’t wear now that you moved to Florida, the electric fondue pot that your best friend gave you as a housewarming gift but is still in the box, the poster from the gallery opening you went to with your ex-boyfriend, the tool set from dad for the workshop you never set up because you live in an apartment, the home gym equipment that is now a clothes rack. It's good Feng Shui to stop feeling guilty and find a new home for all of these things where they will be loved, appreciated, and used.
It doesn’t matter how you move clutter out of your home at the beginning of the year -- you can donate objects, sell them through online sites, donate them to nonprofits, or toss them. The Feng Shui goal of clutter clearing for the New Year is to make space for new energy to flow into your life throughout the days and months to follow.
1. De-Clutter Your Shoe Collection. A good first step into the new year is to clear your shoe clutter. American women keep an estimated 2.9 billion pairs of shoes in their closets. In Feng Shui, when your closets are cluttered with shoes you don't wear, it symbolizes the inability to step forward in your life. This goes for the men and children in your family as well. If you're not wearing all of your shoes, clear them out of your closet and donate them to community charities like Soles4Souls, a nonprofit that distributes gently-worn footwear to more than 300 million children and 1.5 billion adults worldwide.
2. Clear Hobby Clutter. Another way to clear clutter at the beginning of the year is to get rid of supplies from hobbies that no longer interest you. Call up friends with the same hobby and let them take what they want, or sell the supplies on a website whose community is dedicated to the hobby. You could call local stores that sell your supplies to see if they will sell your used supplies on consignment, or if they can identify clubs that could use the supplies. You can also locate nonprofits and/or schools that teach the hobby to see if they will buy the supplies at a discount, or take free supplies off your hands. And of course, you can always sell your supplies on sites like eBay or Craigslist, or recycle them via Freecycle.org.
3. Reduce Your Computer Clutter. Computer clutter is just as much of a Feng Shui issue as clutter anywhere else in your home and office because it slows you down and keeps you from moving forward. First, clear some of the icons from your computer desktop, because clutter there has the same negative effect on your career as a messy desk, blocking productivity and success. Next, clear your operating system by backing up your data and update your operating system with the built-in utilities or an external tool to fix common problems and reduce demands on your system. You can also remove files you don't need from your main hard drive and store them on a separate drive. Purge some things you have saved on other storage media, especially floppy disks, because you probably don't have access to anything that can actually read them. Finally, wipe down your monitors, clear out vents, and clean your keyboard and mouse, because the simple act of removing dust can extend your computer's life.
4. Get Rid of Your “Guilt" Clutter. You know what "guilt clutter" is, it's the guilt over getting rid of gifts that came from someone special, objects that cost you a lot of money, or items you bought but don’t like or need. Your guilt-inducing items might include such things as the wool scarf from mom that you can’t wear now that you moved to Florida, the electric fondue pot that your best friend gave you as a housewarming gift but is still in the box, the poster from the gallery opening you went to with your ex-boyfriend, the tool set from dad for the workshop you never set up because you live in an apartment, the home gym equipment that is now a clothes rack. It's good Feng Shui to stop feeling guilty and find a new home for all of these things where they will be loved, appreciated, and used.
It doesn’t matter how you move clutter out of your home at the beginning of the year -- you can donate objects, sell them through online sites, donate them to nonprofits, or toss them. The Feng Shui goal of clutter clearing for the New Year is to make space for new energy to flow into your life throughout the days and months to follow.
