How To Approach Spring Cleaning Post-Quarantine
A quick guide to clearing your mind & your home
Written by Jake Levyns
With the cold weather of this erratic winter season slowly coming to a pass, it’s about time to prepare for what comes with its defrost. For some, this seasonal transition brings along a desire for change and reflection, or, if you’re lucky, maybe provides a boost of ambition. There’s a small problem with looking at it this way, though: it’s nearly the same perspective we’ve held in regards to moving away from our bad habits over quarantine and, if we’re honest, the entirety of 2020. If we really want to cultivate a new method to declutter our physical and mental spaces in anticipation of the summer months ahead, we have to be willing to look even further in and around us for what is most difficult to fix. It starts, like anything else, with reanalyzing what you surround yourself with every day.
As it is, I don’t have a very big bedroom in my house, which means I have a limited amount of space to fill with my things. Of course, even when I try to be careful about what I let gather, more things end up doing so than I’m able to keep track of, and my willingness to get rid of what can make up space quickly recedes. It’s in these moments when I look around at what I have to do that builds willpower for me to eventually get my life together, because after all, what’s another few days going to do for an overflowing laundry basket or a still half-unpacked box in your closet?
There’s a metaphor in all this, I’m sure, but it’s not so easy to find with our baggage in the way. Really, though, that’s the easiest and most effective way to begin an overhaul of this caliber: take inventory of everything in your immediate vicinity that either no longer serves a purpose for your happiness and sanity or, as Marie Kondo would say, doesn’t “spark joy.” The basis of any spring cleaning comes from not just reorganization, but a reconsideration of how our attitudes change in regard to sentimental objects as well as people who are capable of disappointing us. Only once you get over the first hurdle of what will be different without this in my life will the potential for hurt or misunderstanding go away safely with the garbage truck.
Remember one thing in all this: it helps no one in thinking you’re being selfish for doing what’s best for you. The initial shock of I can’t believe I just let that go is only temporary, but will still last for as long as you choose to hold on to it. This isn’t to say you need to end up dissociating from important touchstones in your life to move on; by simply acknowledging your choice to keep those memories or grudges in the past, you’re choosing a healthier trajectory for yourself and those you love from here on out. It’s often a longer road to self-actualization than we’d prefer, but it always starts with baby steps. All you need is your own belief that you’re better off without carrying around all your burdens.
Now playing…
