Following on our theme of Clearing Out for this month, let’s shift to the next stage in the process – actively working with the YES and NO piles that came from your Last Season’s Accumulations exercise.
Thus far, the choices you’ve made about “what stays and what goes” are seated primarily in intention, not instant actuation.
The full experience of Clearing Out must always involve engagement.
An enthusiasm for the entire process, including the actual doing of the work – not merely the thinking about it. And that doing often involves elbow grease. Getting on our hands and knees to do some honest, good work.
Our energetic and emotional muscles will ache with solid Clearing Out efforts. We’ll be challenged to do things that aren’t part of our “normal” routine and usually, those are the very actions that will move us forward, help us to thoroughly let go of what is no longer ours to carry, make room for what is ready to rise, bloom from the inside out.
IT’S ALSO IMPORTANT TO REMIND YOURSELF THAT CLEARING OUT AND LAYING THE GROUNDWORK FOR NEW MANIFESTATION EFFORTS CAN BE AN EXPERIENCE OF WILDLY-VARYING EXTREMES.
Sometimes, it can feel effortless, liberating, like feathers floating on the breeze and landing in just the right place at just the right time. Other times, it can feel challenging, bordering on defeating, a dirt-underneath-the-nails slog that leaves you wondering why you even started the process and if you’ll be able to finish.
In reality, it’s usually a combination of both.
Some clearing will take just one extra breath from you, while others will take more focus and patience.
Just because you feel a YES behind something doesn’t mean that it will come to be in the next few weeks, or even months. It’s in the YES pile because you want to give it more attention, remember that it’s there, not let it gather dust. And, it might take multiple seasons to manifest, the layers requiring sustained effort or the simple grace of passing time.
Likewise with the NO’s. A NO might take more time than expected to leave your field entirely. Think about when you clear out a closet and keep looking at that one dress or shirt or pair of shoes that has been there for going on 5 years. The thing that you know, in your heart, needs to go – but you still hang onto.
It can be the very same with our internal material. Just because our brain says “Yep! Time to go!!” doesn’t mean that the psyche is ready for the break. You might need to have that thing in your internal closet for a few more seasons before you feel the true release, the complete completion.
THE POINT OF CLEARING OUT IS NOT INSTANT RESULT, BUT A HONING OF INTENTION, A SHARPENING OF COMMITMENT TO WHAT WILL (AND WILL NOT) COMMAND YOUR TIME AND ENERGY.
Manifestation fed by an earnest desire for change and a willingness to embrace parts of the journey that may not look exactly as you had hoped.
Here are some guidelines for moving forward:
Your YES and NO piles now become the subject of your daily prayers and focused efforts. The tangible representation of intentions into which you will pour your love and energy every single day. You might transfer them to sticky notes and put them up on your refrigerator. Or hand write them on special paper and spread them out on your meditation altar.
(A number of years ago, I bought a box of colored wax pencils and transcribed my yes’s and no’s directly onto my bathroom mirror – every time I looked in the mirror, I couldn’t miss the words of intent staring back at me.)
The point is to have a physical reminder – words that you can read, repeat, infuse into your bones. The more you relate to your YES’s and NO’s in this way, the more you are taking them in on a cellular and neurological level, allowing them to impact your thoughts, choices and behaviors. Which ultimately leads to intention becoming reality.
Here’s one caveat:
Focus on your top 1-2 YES’s and top 1-2 NO’s and let the others sit quietly; working with more is usually a setup for overwhelm.
The beauty is that when you work with your most burning desires, all sorts of other things fall into place over time – all of your aspirations often just one step removed from each other. By focusing on the one or two things that feel most essential, you naturally shift the entire energy field in which you’re operating, so that other things then tend to follow along for the ride.
IT ENDS UP LOOKING SOMETHING LIKE THIS:
Essential focus & action: Leave my stress-laden job and step into a new living situation
Bonus clearings & manifestations that come without direct effort: My sleep improves, I stop medicating and I get pregnant
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Ultimately, this exercise becomes the basis for an on-going practice – one in which your intentions are ever-present, receiving a slow drip of your attention and care each and every day.
However, it’s nice to set up a focused, seasonal effort from time to time, to make sure that you’re focusing on what is most relevant and nourishing for your soul. Not to mention to give a boost of energy to your system, wake it and shake it so that you’re sure to be in the sweet spot of your personal growth work.
