I decided to tidy up my room today and clear out a load of old stuff I no longer need or use. It was something I’d been meaning to do for weeks as the room was starting to get cluttered and disorganised, and I just felt like I had way too much ‘stuff’. So I got a large bin bag and some cleaning cloths, and I was ready to be completely ruthless.
We all hold onto things we don’t need and they end up just being shoved away in a cupboard or in a box on a shelf for years. I was beginning to find my room uncomfortable as I had nowhere to put my new things, so the old stuff had to go.
I think it’s the same for holding onto negative ways of thinking. We keep them because they’ve always just been there. We don’t know how we got them or when, we just did. So in order to make room for new ways of thinking, those old ones have to be binned.
I realised recently that I was keeping myself anxious because I never allowed myself to be optimistic. I was always waiting for something bad to happen, because I thought that if something good happened instead, I’d be even happier. I had always told myself that it was better to expect things to go wrong, so that it would be less painful when they did. I don’t know where or when I learnt that way of thinking. I guess at some point I must have been really optimistic about something and then when it didn’t turn out how I’d expected, I blamed myself. I really can be my own worst enemy sometimes.
So I’ve made some space in my room for the things that are still useful and relevant, and have some space left over for new things too.
The Vicious Cycle 