It's Okay To Say No To What Hurts

This instructive talk and meditation helps you discover and remove what is hurting you in your life. It helps you recognize that you are what matters, and anything that hurts you has no place in your life.

Transcript

Hi,

It's Brooks,

And thanks for joining me.

It's good to be here with you.

Today we're going to talk about how it's okay to say no to anything that hurts you in your life.

And that's one of the main parts of clutter busting is to recognize what is hurting you,

What's causing you discomfort.

And it's looking at all the aspects of your life and seeing what doesn't feel good,

What doesn't feel right.

And that includes tangible things,

Your relationships with people,

The activities that you do in your life.

You're looking to see what hurts.

And that's why asking questions is part of the clutter busting process because you're asking yourself,

Does this feel good or not?

When you consider anything in a clutter bust,

You're really looking at that question,

Does this feel good or does this hurt?

And those are the two experiences in life.

And our job is really is to,

You know,

In being alive is saying no to the things that hurt.

And we have permission to do that.

We get to do that.

And this whole process is a reminder.

It reminds us every time we ask,

You know,

We pick up a shirt.

You know,

We're going through our clothes,

We pick up a shirt and we go,

You know,

When I wear this shirt,

Does this make me feel good?

Do I feel beautiful?

Do I feel handsome?

Do I feel healthy?

Does it feel good on my body or not?

You know,

Does it hurt?

Does it feel tight when I wear it?

Do I feel ugly when I wear it?

Like,

You know,

Who knows what comes up?

But you're looking to be honest with yourself.

It's a really powerful and great way to check in because it's really easy to be distracted in life.

We get distracted by the things in the world and it's easy to forget how we're feeling.

It's easy to lose,

To not be able to hear what we're thinking,

What we're feeling.

And in a sense that's what distractions are,

You know?

They pull our attention.

So we come back again by asking questions.

When you're going through food in your refrigerator and you go through each item and you go,

How do I feel when I eat this?

Does this taste good to me after I eat it?

How do I feel afterwards?

You know,

And with a curiosity.

It's not about being right or wrong,

Was I right or wrong by having this in my life?

But you're curious.

Does this thing in my life,

Does it make me feel good or is it hurting me?

I remember I had this client,

We were going through her closet and she had a closet that was made to contain a lot of shoes.

And she had a lot of shoes for the work that she did.

And she didn't really want to go through those shoes.

She thought,

No,

These aren't fine.

But I always feel like you got to question everything.

Because if you question something and you like it,

You're not gonna get rid of it.

Sometimes we fear if we question things we're just gonna get rid of everything.

But if we like it,

It's a nice reminder.

But for her,

I had this sense,

My clutter radar was telling me that there's stuff in this closet that hurts her.

Because I could just,

I sensed her being in pain just being in the closet.

You know,

That's the job of a clutter buster is to notice the pain in the person that you're working with.

Because sometimes they don't notice it themselves.

So I asked her about the shoes.

And I remember this one particular pair of shoes.

And she said that they hurt her feet.

When she put them on pretty quickly after having them on,

They would hurt her.

And I said,

Well,

Can we let him go?

And she goes,

I can't.

And I go,

I said,

Why?

And she said,

Because I need him for my job.

You know,

I think she was in sales and she did a lot of presentations and she felt it was important to be wearing this.

Like it was a good look for her.

Even though it hurt her.

And I said to her,

I said,

Anything that hurts us doesn't have a place in our life.

We can tell ourselves it's important.

But our job is really to remove the things that hurt.

That's why pain exists.

Pain is a reminder.

It's not a reminder.

It's like a,

It's an illuminator that says this hurts.

Stop doing it or remove it.

You know,

If we get a little thorn in our finger,

It's like,

It's there until that pain is there to let us know.

Like,

Oh there's a thorn there.

Remove it.

So I said this to her and,

You know,

Because I asked her about what the pain was like,

What's it like to work and be in pain.

Because she kind of pushed that,

That feeling away.

Because it was more important for her to be,

To be liked in her job.

To be presentational in a sense,

Rather than take care of herself.

And we talked about what that pain was like and then she realized,

Like,

I don't want to do that to myself anymore.

And she got rid of a number of the pairs of shoes.

There's something very sobering about that.

For her to look at that and recognize,

Like,

This hurts me.

I've been protecting something that hurts me and I don't want to do that anymore.

And that's the essence of clutter busting.

I want to take care of myself.

I want to put myself above the things in my life.

And we get to do that.

This,

The whole purpose of this recording and talking about clutter busting is to tell us,

Is a reminder,

Excuse me,

We get to put ourselves first.

So we're gonna do a meditation,

A few minute meditation,

To take a look at our own lives and see if there's anything that hurts.

Using our clutter radar.

So find a comfortable place to sit or to lie down and then close your eyes.

Feel your breath come in and the breath go out.

Feel that relaxation.

The breath coming in,

The breath going out.

It's nice to reconnect with our breath.

It takes us out of our out of overthinking.

It brings things back to the present.

And with your clutter radar and with that curiosity,

Take a simple scan of your life and see if you notice anything that hurts.

Something that doesn't feel good.

It can be anywhere in your life.

And see what your red R shows you.

See what comes up.

You you you you you you and our meditation.

You can open your eyes and stretch and look around.

So maybe you you noticed some things that didn't feel good.

Maybe there's there was some relief in that noticing.

And maybe you might might have been surprised at some of the things that that hurt you in your life.

There's freedom.

Great freedom comes in noticing what hurts and then removing the source of that pain.

And really it really it's a way to love ourselves when we do that.

To discover and remove the source of pain.

Even if we're invested in that thing or we've been protecting that thing that's been hurting us,

The past doesn't matter.

Noticing it and making a decision to remove it as a way of honoring being alive.

Removing the thorns.

And so after this after you've listened to this you'll probably think of some other things.

Because that aspect of your clutter radar is turned on now.

That noticing.

It's your ally.

Your clutter radar is your ally.

So I wish you the best and and take care.

Bye.

Reviews

Amazing! Just what I needed. I will be listening to this daily. Thanks.

Love this! Thank you. I am more aware now.

The timing of this is so good. Thank you ♥️