Why Cleaning Helps You Feel Less Stuck, Overwhelmed, and Anxious About Money

Sometimes the answer to feeling stuck, procrastinating, doubting yourself, being inconsistent, feeling creatively blocked, anxious about money, or like money is flowing out faster than it’s coming in is…

Clean.

I know. Your brain immediately goes: “But I need more clients!” “I need to make more money!” “I have bills to pay!!!” “How in the hell is cleaning out my junk drawer going to help any of that?!?!?”

Because cleaning creates room in your life for the things you want...

especially if you tend to have lots of clutter.

It creates a vacuum so what you need can come ot you.

This doesn’t mean you need to scrub your bathroom floors for six hours or suddenly become a neat freak.

I’m talking about: Cleaning out the junk drawer. Getting rid of old clothes. Throwing away expired crap in your fridge. Tossing all of the receipts living in your car.

Especially pay attention to the spaces where money closely interacts with your life: Your purse. Your wallet. Your email inbox. Your desk. Your computer. Your file cabinet.

And here’s what’s interesting: When you start cleaning, you often find little pockets of stuck emotional energy.

Old bills that were already paid. Receipts from stressful periods of your life. Love letters from an ex. Random paperwork from something painful. Things that make you stop and go: “UGH. Why do I still have this?”

I had stacks of old journals full of obsessive thoughts about money, fear, scarcity, stress, trying to “figure it all out.”

They needed to get the hell out of my house.

Not because journals are bad.

But because they carried an old version of me and an old energy that I no longer wanted sitting in the space where I work, create, and live.

And if you struggle to let things go, whether that’s money or stuff, there is often an emotional reason for that.

Holding onto things can absolutely be a trauma response.

Especially if there was food insecurity, housing instability, chaos, unpredictability, financial stress, or a feeling growing up that what you had could disappear at any moment.

Stuff can feel safer than money because stuff stays. Money leaves.

So people hold onto clothes they don’t wear, boxes they never open, makeup from 2007, piles of paperwork, random cords to devices that no longer exist, and 47 almost-empty lotion bottles “just in case.”

So start gently.

Do NOT start with the place that feels the most overwhelming. For me, that’s my basement storage room and the disaster that is my computer files (I work on this little by little, usually with an entertaining show on).

You'll get there eventually.

Start where you feel drawn.

And if you don’t know where to begin, make it a sacred practice and ask: “Divine, where should I start?”

Seriously. Listen. Strengthen your practice of being guided and trusting.

Then set a timer for 15 minutes and begin.

And sometimes emotions come up while you clean. Old memories come up. You suddenly feel like crying or angry or emotional for no apparent reason.

That’s normal.

You’re moving things physically and emotionally.

This is not about having a spotless house.

You don’t need to have one more thing to feel like you have “to do” or overly high expectations- that just creates more stress.

The goal is movement….and opening to possibilities!!

So keep what you love, use, and need.

And start letting the rest go.