Once upon a time, not so long ago, I had 40,000 unread emails. That is not an exaggeration. I had 40,000, and that number, with all the zeros, was one I ignored for a good while. Funny enough, somewhere along the line, I read the number as 4,000 (quite fascinating how the mind alters things to cope with them.) Nevertheless, as anyone with a smartphone knows, that little red notification sat just on the corner of my email app, passive-aggressively shouting “40,000 unread emails!” at me whenever I looked at my phone.
As a result, no matter how productive I had been, I always felt behind. I carried a low-grade anxiety around with me, never able to quite put my finger on it. A new email would innocently arrive in my inbox, and the sight of all the as-yet-read emails would send me into low-grade anxious panic. Now I was wondering what emails I might be missing, and then would make up tall tales about those imaginary emails, deciding that maybe the student I lost touch with or the friend who had to cancel our lunch date was actually the sender of one of those 40,000 emails…
Finally, I had had enough. I cleared out a weekend and decided to become a speed reader – of emails at least. I spent two whole days going through every single one of the 40,000 unread messages — reaching all the way back to March 2013. What started as dread slowly but surely, one email after another, gave way to a clarity that I wasn’t expecting.
I recently revisited the work of author Tosha Silver, and I was reminded that the areas of our lives we neglect or resist are actually guideposts. In her book It’s Not Your Money, she writes about how cleaning out the cluttered spaces in our lives makes way for all kinds of revelations, healings, and gifts. Her advice is simple: try to see nothing as “mine.” Everything belongs to the divine. And when we release our tight grip on the things we call “mine”, life begins to flow in marvelous ways.
Cleanliness and rituals of cleansing are nearly universal across cultures and religions. There are mikvah immersions and preparations for Shabbat; in yogic traditions, saucha or “purity” is a foundational spiritual discipline; in Christianity, there is baptism, and in Indigenous traditions, we find smoke cleansing and purification rites. The instinct to wash, to clear, to reset comes naturally before we enter sacred space, celebrate, gather, or manifest.
The idea of cleaning, clearing, or organizing, say, the garage, might elicit a feeling of dread—or a desire to straight up run for the hills. We certainly don’t think of decluttering spaces in our home as “purification” or “sacred”—it mostly just feels like a giant chore that we’re happy to put off for as long as possible, just like me with my mountain of emails. But what if it was purifying and sacred?
When you open a drawer and ask, “What is ready to go?” you are actually practicing trust. When you donate clothes you no longer wear, you are saying to the universe: I believe there is more and I’m making room. When you recycle old papers, delete outdated emails, release resentments—big or small—you are declaring that you are ready for new Light to enter. The clutter that we avoid processing is often a manifestation of the most tender emotions that we are also avoiding.
We hold onto objects because of who we were, or who we were with, when we bought them. We replay old conversations because of what we wish we had said. We hold onto old clothes, trinkets, broken furniture, because letting these things go means we’re letting go of parts of our past. We let emails pile up because the backlog is so immense that we have no idea where to start (Hi, that was me!)
Cleaning an area of our external lives helps us take small steps toward processing things we might not even know need processing in our inner lives. And the good news is you can start really, really small.
Here are a few small ways to get you started on the road to inner and outer cleanliness:
In Your Home
Choose a drawer. Just one. You probably already know which one it is. Commit to throwing out everything that isn’t serving you. Busted utensils, loose screws, dried up gluesticks, crumpled papers, expired coupons, everything that really can’t be used anymore. Notice what feels heavy, notice what feels neutral, and pay attention to what feels good. If it creates contraction, it’s time for it to go.
In Your Email
Our inbox is a sneaky place. Junk piles up, but it’s easy to not even know it’s there. Still, our email is another extension of us, and cleaning it up can free up a lot of space—on your devices and in your mind. Spend an hour unsubscribing from what you don’t read. Delete anything irrelevant or years old. Respond to one message you’ve been avoiding.
In Your Schedule
Our schedules are another place where we can go unconscious and rack up a hefty energy bill if we aren’t careful. Take a few minutes today to look at your upcoming week. While we all have commitments and responsibilities, I’m willing to bet there are a few things that can go—like the birthday party of someone you aren’t really that close with, or a PTA event you said you’d help with but don’t really have the time for, or an exercise class you’ve been taking for years that isn’t actually challenging you anymore.
And if you get stuck, feel overwhelmed, or find yourself flooded by unexpected emotion, you can ask the Creator for guidance:
“Creator, I put all of this in your hands. Guide me. Show me what is ready to go.”
The material world and all of our possessions—even the most basic, boring, or functional—are all an illusion. It’s an outpicturing of our thoughts, beliefs, and habitual actions, and where there is stagnancy in our physical surroundings, you can bet there’s stagnancy in our internal surroundings as well. Let your cluttered drawers, messy closets, and tightly packed storage spaces be guides, showing you where you’re ready to release and make space.
Blessings need a place to land. Who says it can’t be your closet?
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