Ten things you should get rid of

From dust covered magazines to broken pieces of electronic devices, I'm sure we all share our precious room with unnecessary things that make it hard for us to clean, organize and find room for the things that actually work, or are useful. I myself, after a long lecture I gave myself inside my head, decided I should grow up and get rid of the things I don't use anymore... and buy me some sweet treats to celebrate afterwards. 

In case you also want to take this small step for you, but huge leap for your room, here are the best advices I can give you. Throw away:

1. Those old pens that don't work anymore

Yes, they may be cute, and they may be great memories reminders, no one says you can't keep anything that's not working (though that's not a bad idea at all) but need I remind you they aren't working and occupying space on your desk or in the drawers. You can keep some of them for memories but not too many, and if they are only memories related, keep only the ones that stirr good memories. Speaking of memories

2. The suffocating memories

Keep some memories, especially those that remind you of the good old times and other things you know you might want to remember for the rest of your life, but throw away the ones that don't bring a smile on your face when you see them. 

3. Some of your old toys

I have absolutely nothing against a couple of old toys, especially those favorite toys you had as a kid, but don't keep everything. I've been in rooms that had more plush toys than shops. I mean come on! That's straight OCD! No one says you shouldn't keep some toys just make sure there's still room to open the doors and windows. You can also do a very nice thing and donate those toys, either to the little neighbors you have or to those more unfortunate than you - you know the type of kids that rarely get toys. This way you'll feel double good - you'll have more space in the room and you'll feel good knowing others are enjoying and playing with those toys that otherwise would've just laid around

4. Clothing and shoes you haven't worn in the last 18 months (I'll include bags in here as well)

Yeah, I know you were going to wear it so many times but... don't start to give me those excuses. I bet there are plenty of clothes you haven't wore in the past 18 months and most probably you never will do it again. Again, I encourage you keeping a couple (when I say a couple I mean a couple - two or three at most!) of your favorite ones but the rest has to go. Look on the bright side, you'll have an excuse to not feel bad when you'll get those jeans you had your eyes on for a while now. 

5. Power cords and various connective cables 

I'm talking about the ones that don't work, are not required anymore (eg. your old phone is long gone but you still keep the charger and the USB cable) or the duplicates. Whenever we buy a new gadget, it comes with its own cables, and at least one of them is a USB cord. So keep the cables, cords for the current gadgets you have and throw the rest. 

6. Magazines 

Yeah, I know there are pages that have useful things like recipes, beauty advices, great stories and so on, and I'm not saying don't keep those, I'm saying don't keep the whole magazine just for that - see where I'm going? Keep only the pages you need from the magazines, keep cut outs or even better, just scan the pages/info you need and keep it in a special folder on your computer/laptop/phone/tablet, whichever you prefer. 

7. Old makeup, perfumes and other beauty products

They do have an expiration date you know? Make up and other beauty products are already toxic enough as it is, you don't need them to get even worse. And about those perfumes you received as gifts and don't really like the scent, ask friends or family if they want them - just make sure you don't ask the person that gave you the gift that.

8. Everything that's expired: pills, vitamins, food and so on

Do I really need to talk to you about why you should not use them after they expire?. Just throw them

9. Broken things you didn't take the time to repair and probably never will 

Yeah, I know you were going to fix it but... insert your excuse here. If you didn't find the time to repair it in the past six months you'll probably never get to it, but just to make sure keep it for six more months. If however, those 6 more months passed and you still didn't fix it (either because you didn't have the time, mood, money bla bla or just you simply couldn't) just throw it. 

10. The grudges

As I stated in a previous post holding grudges, not forgiving doesn't help you at all. So let the past be the past and focus on this moment. What's done is done and you can't change that, but you can change what you do and how you feel right now.

Wishing you the best,
Rachel

Let's not forget about forgiving

I know, after this long period of non activity on blog, you might wonder why would I chose to talk about that "uncomfortable" activity of forgiving? Well, my dearest readers, I've learned so many things in this life and amongst the most important of them was forgiveness (and the hardest). 
I used to be a profesional grudge holder (as one of my poems stated) and no matter how much I would read about forgiveness or hear people talk motivational kind of stuff about it I just couldn't do it. I always believed it was fair to stay angry at someone if they did you wrong. The thing I would always fail to see has how that was damaging me. But oh believe me, when I've finally changed the way I perceive forgiveness I got rid of a lot of headaches and my life really improved.
The things that really changed my perception of forgiveness were two phrases and a book :). The two phrases that caught my attention were: " Holding a grudge is like allowing someone to live rentfree in your mind" - I roared when I realized that's true. The mindblower however was: "you're not even angry because they did something wrong, you're angry because it didn't turn out the way you wanted it to, which makes you a selfish little b...". 

Trust me, forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. You may wonder why...
- Do you know that when you are feeling angry/frustrated about something, when you hold a grudge, your brain perceives all the sadness or anger as if it's happening right now? When your brain feels in danger, whether it’s real or just imagined, the body responds with a defensive mechanism know as  “fight-or-flight” reaction, or the stress response. This mechanism is your body's way of protecting you. Of course in certain events, such as emergency situation this will save your life by giving you extra strength to defend yourself, for example. BUT, when there's no emergency, this mechanism will damage your health. Unforgiveness can cause disease. It can actually make you sick, by acting as if you are in danger and consuming way more energy for no reason, and not just that. You should google doctors opinion on stress, anger and resentment for better explanations :).
- Unforgiveness often leads depression. It keeps you in this vicious circle where you keep thinking back (relieving actually) about what happened and why you are angry at someone, or why you cannot forgive them.
- Unforgiveness keeps you tied to that person and the past. Because whenever you see them, see someone that resembles them, or hear their name, you immediately recall the bad experience you had his those people, hence it'll send your mind in a past loop.
- Unforgiveness fills you with resentment, it makes you feel blue :(. And usually when that happens, you tend to take it out on the ones that are close to you at that time...which is always so unfair.  

The most important things you need to understand about forgiveness is:
1. Forgiveness doesn't mean you have to accept those people as part of your life. It also doesn't mean you can/should trust them again. It just means you no longer hold on to those bad thoughts about them, don't feel the need to prepare a delicious cold dish of revenge or relieve those past events.
2. Forgiveness cuts the threats keeping you tied in the past. Forgiveness is literally setting yourself free from those bad thoughts and feelings.

3. Forgiveness helps you grow and develop. After you decide to forgive someone that had hurt you in the past, you release those bad thoughts and feelings that took your time, you'll have that time to think positive thoughts. Also, once you let go of seeing yourself as a victim because of what that person did to you, you take responsability for your happiness.
4. Forgiveness helps you heal. As I said before, not letting go of the past, constantly relieving those events keep you in the "flight-of-fight" reaction. As soon as you let go of those thoughts and resentments, the body functions under normal circumstances... imagine how relieving that must be. Just try this: hold a frown for five minutes. After those minutes pass relax your facial muscles, just let them be-see how good that feels.
5. Forgiveness is for your benefit, not the other. The other couldn't give more of a f...fish :) if you forgive them or not, whereas when you are feeling like a victim, you are the one carrying a heavy burden. Forgiveness allows you to get out of the spiderweb or regrets, pain and frustration.

Also, most of the times, the others don't even mean to hurt you, they just have their own messed up lives, and usually there's one of these two situations that causes their behaviour:
1. They envy you for your talent/beauty/mind/whatever it may be and they try to bring you down so that they can feel better about themselves.
2. They think they know what's best for you, case in which they actually want what's best for you. There are also many people that give tough love too much credit and overreact when using it.

Hoping I convinced you to start forgiving I'll wish you the best, and send you my hugs for being brave enough to stop being a victim. And in case you ever need to talk to someone, or need to be heard out, just send me a mail and I'll get back asap. :)