28 | The Process of Letting Go
28 | The Process of Letting Go
Today’s episode is about the process of letting go and how to clear space, literally and figuratively, for what you actively need.
I am proud to be a Certified Deep Dive coach. The Deep Dive philosophy centers on embodiment and the belief that emotions, bodily experience, and intuition are key sources of wisdom for our life choices. So there isn’t just one way to let go. Embracing an organized life is deeply knowing why you are keeping certain people or things in your life, and those stories are unique to your experience, emotions, and stories.
Use this episode as a guide to reflect on what is working or not working within your decluttering journey. I share a few reasons why letting go isn’t as straightforward for some as it is for others. I also walk you through my process for letting go of items, thoughts, relationships, and anything that isn’t earning its keep in your life anymore. Remember, you are capable of changing your relationship to clutter because you are more organized than you think.
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Intro: Welcome to a Pleasant Solution, Embracing An Organized Life. I'm your host, certified life coach, professional organizer and home life expert, Amelia Pleasant Kennedy. I help folks permanently eliminate clutter in their homes and lives. On this podcast, we'll go beyond the basics of home organization to talk about why a clutter-free mindset is essential to an aligned and sustainable lifestyle. If you're someone with a to-do list, if you're managing a household and if you're caring for others, this podcast is for you. Let's dive in.
Amelia: Welcome to Episode 28, “The Process of Letting Go.” One of the qualifications I’m most proud of attaining is that of a Deep Dive Certified Coach. The Deep Dive philosophy, created by Master Coach Bev Aron centers on embodiment. It focuses on our emotions, our bodily experience, and our intuition as key sources of wisdom for our life’s choices. Bev shares, “Embodiment is what makes the Deep Dive Coach so open – open to hearing what is not being said, to seeing what is not directly visible, and to exploring what has not yet been explored.” And for most of us, that’s the emotional landscape of our lives. The stories we’re holding onto, the objects, the people. Clutter Coaching, in my opinion, is exploring these stories and relationships is a way that allows you to consciously choose what earns its keep in your life.
Deep Dive Coaching is the reason you hear me speak directly to curiosity on this podcast. I believe it’s a tool that allows you to look at the pieces and parts of your life and understand that beneath it all is a human being that’s completely whole, lovable, worthy, and capable, no matter what life’s circumstances have brought to your doorstep. The work that I do with clients is both powerful and needed because it begins from a safe space where you are never made to feel wrong about the choices you’ve made in life. The clutter – physical, mental, emotional – is a byproduct of what made absolute sense to you before this moment. You’re always one decision away from letting it go, and you’ll do so when both your body and brain are in alignment with the decision.
So, on today’s episode I’ll be sharing a few reasons why letting go isn’t as straightforward for some as it is for others. I’ll outline my process for letting go of items, thoughts, relationships… anything that isn’t earning its keep in your life anymore. It’s a process I’ve guided clients through, and each one has adapted the framework to their individual situation. You already know that there’s not just one way to “let go,” so use this episode as a guide to reflect on what’s currently working (or not) within your own decluttering journey. Embracing an organized life is deeply knowing why you’re keeping certain people or things in your life so that letting go clears more space (literally and figuratively) for what you actively keep.
First, let me outline a few reasons why letting go may be a challenge for you. Let me be clear. These reasons why are NOT excuses. They are simply your default, long held, go-to stories that make it more challenging for you to let go. Each of these reasons has a solution (or series of solutions), and when you’re ready, you can choose to untangle the reason slowly and safely with a trained professional. The goal is to work on your present thoughts about what may have happened in the past. It’s not helpful to go back in time to the trauma itself. Again, I’ll briefly describe these reasons, not go in depth.
Losing a loved one or family member is one of the most common reasons it can be a struggle to let go. Objects spark memories, and you may feel dependent on the object to retain the memories of the individual. The item seems like a placeholder for the person, therefore, retaining the item keeps you close to the loved one, the pain, the anger or sense of abandonment, and / or the joy of the relationship. However, our relationships with others are built through interactions, our thoughts, and time spent together. Building trust and a level of internal peace about a relationship happens through storytelling, examining the relationship from both perspectives, and by being willing to feel associated feelings until they run their course.
Childhood memories and the environment you grew up in is another factor in your ability to detach from items. Growing up impoverished or with unstable home life deepens attachment to belongings. If you were regularly on the move because of lack of housing, divorced parents, civil unrest, etc., your belongings were one source of consistency. Even though you may have a completely different set of belongings as an adult, this lack of stability can stay lodged in your body and psyche for decades. Generations who’ve lived through economic depression have a harder time letting go because the inner trust that life will remain safe and prosperous is hovering in the background. One client I worked with realized that she was surrounded by toys and objects as a young child, to mask or hide her mother’s instability. Acknowledging these influences brings both awareness and understanding, and later levels of compassion to your individual letting go process.
Persons with tendencies to hoard objects have a hard time distinguishing the level of importance or value between types of items. They value items that typically would be discarded on the same level as piece of fine jewelry. The overabundance becomes impossible to manage without outside intervention and support. Those who are chronically disorganized, on the other hand, have had a major life disruption that’s affected their ability to stay on top of items within their household. This was the case with my mother, who’s now living with dementia. Divorce, retirement, depression, and dementia most likely combined to create the disorder in her home.
Again, I share a few of these reasons to help you feel seen, validated, and to know that levels of disorganization or organization have many hidden or unacknowledged factors. Your individual struggles with letting go of difficult relationships or excessive belongings make sense AND rewiring your brain and body to a different relationship with objects IS possible.
Next, let me share the process I use with clients. This is about unlearning previous strategies and default ways of being. It takes time, patience, and practice. I am not a licensed therapist, so my approach begins with clients that are functioning in their daily lives. They currently may be working with a therapist, yet the healing process of past traumas is underway. My role as a Clutter Coach is to gently dive below the surface to help you untangle stories and process emotions in order to make decisions and build self-trust. To share words from a long-time client, “You can’t see the possibilities in the beginning. There’s too much stuff in the way.” After our time together she acknowledged, “All this stuff didn’t represent things the way I thought it did. Life has been more about the experiences.” If you’re looking to let go of items and the attached emotions and weight of associated stories, then Clutter Coaching is for you.
There are five general parts to my process. Yes, they happen in order, but just like anything, you’ll often drift between steps forwards and then backwards to go forwards again. It’s not always linear. Instead, it’s about aligning your logical mind with what your body already knows to be true. Once you create better communication between your gut or intuition and your logical brain, the decision-making process becomes easier and clearer. And the more you build the emotional resilience associated with letting go, the stronger this skill will become in your life.
Surprise! Step one starts with curiosity. Our thoughts about the items we own create our emotional experience. You’ll want to break apart the facts about your belongings from the story you have about them. You can do this through journaling. Select one item or small set of similar items you have an attachment to. The facts are the indisputable qualities of the item: its size and shape, how it’s being stored, where it’s being stored, who gave it to you and when, where they got the item, and its overall condition and functionality.
Your story, on the other hand, is all the thoughts, feelings, and opinions you have about the object. This is your subjective attachment, and these are all the reasons, excuses, and explanations your brain is giving you about why the item is meaningful, useful, or sentimental. Your story FEELS real. It FEELS like fact. Trust me. I’ve seen it in my own life. I’ve seen it in client’s lives. This is the part of you that says you’ll “need it” one day. Your mom would be “upset” if you let it go. Your kids might “want it” when they grow up. You’ll be sad, distraught, or regret it if you let it go. This is the part of you that says it’s better off in your home than sitting for decades in the landfill. Your story tells you that you “can’t decide,” or “don’t know what to do with it.”
Whatever your story may be, the first step to letting go is actually giving the story airtime. Give it space to be. Acknowledge it. Hear it. Let it out of your head and heart into the world. Write it down. Say it out loud. Record yourself telling the story. See and allow the memory. Let me pause right here and say that if this is ALL you do or take away from today’s podcast, I’ll be proud and thankful. I love the professional organizing industry, and many in-home organizers aren’t equipped enough to give time and space to this step. Yet, it’s necessary. Our stories are important to us. They’re how we track time and build generational connections. By simply recognizing and accepting that you have a relationship to the objects in your home and life, you’ll be on your way to identifying exactly which of those belongings meets your needs and which of them doesn’t. The object and its story are two distinct things, and you will decide which one is most important to you.
For step two, you’ll set aside your story and shift to examine the logical practicalities related to this object or set of objects. Objectively, how much space does the item take up? For me, many of my family heirlooms were antique pieces of furniture. They took up significant space. As I was downsizing, I knew that identifying several smaller mementos of past generations made more practical sense. Think about the amount of space. Consider how much time it will take to maintain the object. If it’s delicate or breakable and you have to place it in storage, why is that better than taking a photo and letting the item go? Storing something puts it out of view and out of mind. You don’t get the daily joy or memory boost when it's tucked away. If the item needs repair or special care, consider whether you’re willing to donate time and money to restoration. If it’s an item of clothing, consider whether you’re actively wearing it or are afraid to do so for one reason or another
Again, allow yourself to think logically and practically to identify how much time, money, or emotional energy it is taking to keep the item in your home. If it’s a collection of objects, consider whether you have the space to display them OR if the desire is to reap a financial reward from selling the collection, what’s keeping you from taking action towards a sale today? You’re always making decisions, whether you recognize it or not, and the decision to keep something is layered with the practicalities of the item earning its keep within your home.
Step three of five is building self-trust. Moving from feeling unsure about your choice to let go to being sure that it’s the right decision happens over time. It’s internal work. It’s a process where you can engage little bits at a time. Ask yourself, “What would life be like without this one item?” Allow yourself to dream and feel. Picture your home without it. Given all the activities you engage in on a daily basis, think about the amount of bandwidth it occupies in your life today. Then think about how you’d manage without it. You’re not deciding yet. You’re not taking action to let it go, yet. You’re exploring and deepening your self-trust internally.
This is a powerful step. I’ve witnessed clients actively problem solve, in advance of letting items go. They’ve identified and decided the emotions they’d feel without the object. They’ve figured out how they’d get access to another version of the item if it’s one that was useful. They’ve discovered a suitable substitute… all before letting the initial item go. Books and journals are an excellent example. We want to retain the knowledge or ideas, so we keep the books. Building self-trust gives you the opportunity to recognize that you only need the title of the book as a reference, not the book itself. If the information was desperately needed, you could borrow the book from the library or find a used copy to access. Your journals are written documentation of information that’s stored in your mind and body, and you can choose to believe that you’ve learned what you need.
Step four is allowing and processing any emotions related to the story you identified in step one. Each of us processes emotion differently, and it often involves focusing on the feelings that arise in your body in a conscious way. Music can spur emotion. Walking or movement can spur emotion. Sitting with your thoughts can spur emotion. There’s no right way. It’s about feeling the grief, anger, and bittersweet feelings. Or similarly the joy or pride for the moment in time that object came into your life. Being willing to feel your feelings is essential to letting an item go. When you’re ready to feel in the present, and you’re willing to feel in the future, you’re absolutely unstoppable. Remember, your emotion is stemming from how you’re thinking about the story, the memory, or the item. Know that you can retain ownership of those things even after you let the physical object go. There’s no “right” length of time to process emotions. The more you practice, the easier it will become. You’ll get to know yourself on a deeper level. This is the embodiment or mind/body connection I was referring to earlier in the episode. There’s no need to rush yourself. You’ll know when it’s time to make a decision.
In Episode 17, I cover “Decision Making Fundamentals.” You’ll be ready to decide after exploring the object’s story and your attachment to it versus the facts. You’ll be ready having considered practically speaking whether you want to continue to grant this object (or relationship) in your life moving forward. The past and your choices are irrelevant. You’re deciding from this day onward. This is step five. You absolutely can give yourself permission to keep it. Own that choice and have your own back. You absolutely can give yourself permission to let it go. Own that choice and have your own back. No one direction is better than the other. It’s consciously choosing today that matters. Delaying a decision will require you to go through this letting go process all over again.
You are capable of changing your relationship to clutter. You’re more organized than you think. Yes, it will take time. Yes, it will feel uncomfortable, AND emotions are part of life. You’ve weathered lots of emotional turmoil in other areas of life: work, love, loss, extraordinary growth. Once you step into your power around clutter, it will apply to every area of your life. Talk to y’all soon.
Outro: Hey y'all, I'd be honored if you'd take three minutes to leave a review of this podcast. Your time is precious and by leaving a review, A Pleasant Solution will reach more listeners and lives. I'd also love to hear your feedback and share your review on a future episode. Talk to y'all soon and remember, you are more organized than you think..
