Ep 157: The December Edit: Prepping for a Clutter-Free New Year

It's about having the clarity , self-confidence and unstoppable belief to go after and get everything you want . If you'll come with me , I'll show you how Well . Hello friends . I hope you had an amazing week . It's only a couple weeks to Christmas and you know what that means . Christmas is a time of year when we are very busy .

We have parties , we have a frenzied set of activities at work because , at least in America , the last couple of weeks of the year are kind of dead . But leading up to that , the first two weeks of December is always a little crazy , trying to cram in every meeting and get completed with every sort of open project that you might have .

And then , of course , there's putting up the decorations and there's all of the shopping and all of the stuff . So all of the December stuff . But I still love December and I love the holidays for so many reasons . But today I want to talk about something a little unusual . I want to talk about the opposite of what December is usually about .

In the United States , at least , december is usually about the acquiring of things . We're bringing things into the house , gifts other people have given us gifts . We're buying for other people .

We are going to be receiving gifts many of us from those that we know and love , and if you're like me , sometimes when you're buying for other people you buy for yourself too . Sometimes I do that and so we're . There's just a lot of adding to our possessions . That happens in December , but I would say a lot of times .

December is , of course , at the end of the year and as we've gone through the year , many of us have just been in without even sometimes thinking about it in a purposeful way . We've just acquired things . Some of those are possessions that we love and use every day . Some of those are not . Some of those just come into the house and then they feel like me .

So I even have things in my closet with the textile on it . So sometimes it's not as purposeful of a purchase . But I'm also not just talking about the possessions that we have . That'll be a part of it , but I want to talk about all the things in our life . And why is it important to do that , or to start doing that anyway in December ?

I understand there's not a lot of extra time Most of us have in December we're busy , you know . But New Year's is just around the corner and a lot of us like to go into the year and start to think about what the year might have in store for us and what we want to do with the year .

And so , before we do that kind of thinking about setting goals and picking areas of focus and things like that , I think it's really important to just stop and to survey our life and think about it as being the editor of your life . You know many of you know if you've listened to the podcast I like to write romantic comedies .

I'm actually getting ready to start some nonfiction books for this business as well . But I like to write , and I always have , and up till now it's been more of a hobby , but it will , as I said , become part of this business . There's a couple of books I have outlines for them getting ready to start , and the role of an editor in bookwriting is critical .

You know , you can't just have the author writing this beautiful prose and like , if you look at romantic comedies like I like to write . You know there's an arch to the story .

Or , if you like to go to movies , there's a series of acts as you go through and there's different things from a technical perspective that need to happen at the beginning of the story , as they're introducing into the characters you know , versus in the middle of the story to keep the plot going and driving along with energy , and then the beautiful conclusion of

the story at the end . So there's a way to do that . But it isn't just about that . That's one part of it . But the critical part really is the editor , and that's usually not the author , it's usually someone else who's looking at your story with fresh eyes and is taking a more objective view .

And not , they haven't fallen in love with the character , they haven't fallen in love with the prose and they're kind of in there .

I don't want to say ruthlessly , but sort of it feels like that if you're a writer where they're just sort of slashing things , like they can cut whole characters , a character you might be in love with , and they're just like this one's not needed . You're like what you know .

It's almost painful , but when they're done the story is crisp and it's tight and it's beautifully done , like all the threads come together and the sentences evoke emotion in the way that the author dreamed of it doing .

And there's just they remove words , they tighten up the pace , they take out unnecessary characters or scenes , like it's a really , really important process , this editing process . Sometimes they will recommend you add things in , but a lot of times it's about taking things out . And so today I want you to look at your life that way .

We're going to look at six categories of things and I want you to think about your life all in as we go through these six things , and think about what could you do to tighten up your life , to remove unnecessary things from your life , to lighten your load , to get ready to have the space mentally , physically , emotionally , to the space for the new things that

you're trying to do or bring into your life next year . So I think this is really important . It doesn't have to start with actually physically doing the editing , implementing the editing Right now . Today . What I want you to start doing is just start thinking about it , start strategizing about it and start planning for it .

I feel like in the United States anyway , we are a country of acquisition , like we have this penchant of just buying things and having things and , granted , it keeps the economy going , and so I'm not trying to make a statement or judge anyone else .

I've certainly been guilty of it myself , but it's like , at the end of at the end of the day , if you don't edit things out as you go through your life and you just keep acquiring , you end up with a basement and a garage and an attic and closets that are just packed with stuff .

And then I don't know if the rest of the world is like this , but in America there are very thriving businesses that are self-storage businesses that people will take or get a pod or they'll get a series of truckloads of things and they'll take them out of their house and move them into this self-storage unit .

Sometimes people have a couple of those units and they don't even know what's in them and they never use the things that are in there , right ?

So again , I'm not judging , but I'm just saying it's easy to have happen and if you're going to be a good editor of your own life , that is an ongoing discipline of asking yourself like do I need this thing , am I still using this thing ?

And even moving past the emotions that that can bring up , because a lot of times we develop , even if we never wear the oathing item or look at the book or use the home decor that we bought , it's like there's an attachment to it , there's a memory attached to it .

If it's something that was passed down to us , there's deep emotional connections that we have to that , tied to the precious memories that we might have , and we think that we can't get rid of the thing , because if we do , we're somehow diminishing the memory or we're eliminating the memory . And I'm here to tell you that is just not the case .

It's just not the case and I can say this from experience . I'm not perfect . My house is , you know , it's funny Like I try to be very I've moved so many times in my corporate career I think I've told you 14 cities , you know and I did that in a very compressed period of time Like I haven't moved now for like eight years .

I have changed houses but I've not moved cities . So I'm a mover , but I will say like , even now , as good as I've been about getting rid of things , it's amazing to me Like I still acquire stuff . It's just what we do , I think , in our life and I think we can't be afraid to take a really objective eye .

Like I described the role of an editor , a book editor . It's like they're not emotionally connected to the stuff , they're just looking at it for what it is right . So that's kind of the game I want you to play .

There's nothing really to do because you probably can't fit it into your schedule right now anyway , but I would say like if you use the last two to three weeks of the year to ask yourself these questions I'm gonna ask you today about the six different categories of things .

It gives you kind of a plan , an elimination plan , a simplification plan going into the start of the year that you can implement .

In January , when it's too cold to get out and do anything , when football season is winding down for me , you know when it's like less fun and there's not as much to do , it's a great time of year to purge and for some people that might be a triggering word , so I like to call it the December edit .

And as I walk you through these things today , I do wanna acknowledge for some people it might be really hard and I understand that .

I mean I love to read and so one of the hardest things that I ever did was , you know , over the course of my life I acquired books , books from my childhood , books that I wanted to read just as a young adult , and into my midlife , and I had some books .

I had a lot of books and , you know , as I started to move to these 14 different cities , I thought I cannot carry all of these books with me . I mean , they were like I don't even know .

Let's just say at one point there's probably 20 boxes of books and I would say large size boxes of books , heavy , large size boxes of books , you know , and I had a beautiful bookcase to put them in and all this stuff and it sounds fabulous .

But I would say , only if you're never planning to move , because packing the books up and you know , as a woman , trying to haul those books all over the place , it was just too much and I had to do it in waves .

When I got rid of them , I got rid of the easiest ones first , and then it was only a couple years ago . I started this process , like in 2004 , you know . So it's been 19 years . It was really only a couple , three years ago that I got rid of the last of the books .

I digitized everything , so it's all on my Kindle app on my iPad and I said , yes , I had to buy the book again , but for me it was a small price to pay , because now the beauty of it is , I can carry my books with me wherever I go , if I want to take them to work with me and read on my lunch hour which I never have time to do , but it always

sounds like a great idea . Or , you know , if I want to go on the plane or if I'm , you know , traveling , or whatever , my books are with me . They're not sitting in my study , in my bookcase , and I don't have to load myself down with 25 pounds of books that I'm carrying with me .

They're all on my iPad and I know , listen , there's nothing I like more than a library smell . Or I love going in a Barnes Noble , but I'm gonna be honest with you , I don't go in there much because I will buy a book . Sometimes I do , and I'm flipping through because I just like to do it .

It's fun , but I take note of the ones I'm interested in and then I go buy them on the Kindle . So I'm just one example . There are many things that we can have . So I'm just tell you that , to say I get it . So what we're about to talk about here can be very triggering .

It can be really , really hard , it can feel overwhelming , it can feel impossible , it can feel I don't know . I don't wanna say scary , but like I did not wanna let go of some of those books . They were super important to me , even fiction books from some of my favorite authors .

So I understand , but try to keep an open mind as we walk through this , because it is important to try , at least once a year , to be a meaningful editor of your life overall . And we're not just gonna talk about possessions , but we are gonna start there . So let's dive in to number one , which is possessions .

So for this , I think it's good to just you know this is a strategy session . You don't have to do anything , but I do think you need to look .

You need to take a hard look in your closets , in your garage , in your basement if you have one in your attic , and you need to ask yourself like have you been editing things out just naturally as you go , or do your closets look like they're about to explode ?

Do you have boxes full of things that you don't know what's in them , right , even , like , open your drawers , how many junk drawers do you have ? Or even the ones that aren't junk drawers .

Like , you know how much stuff do you have , and I think in every category , not just your master closets , not just your wardrobe and your shoes that , of course but you know everything In your office closet , in the guest room closet , you know . You know if you have children in your children's closets , what do you have in there ?

And when was the last time some of the stuff was worn , and does it even fit you anymore , or is it even in style anymore ? So , right , that's the thing to ask about the clothes .

If you're like me , like , I love beauty products and self care . I'm a girly girl and you know , like , if you look in your makeup case or cases , have you edited that stuff out ? How long have you had some of the stuff , and do you even want it anymore ?

Right , what about , like the hair care products or the styling tools , or all the little contraptions that we buy , at least as women , you know , for our hair , for our skin , like , do you use it ? Could someone else use it more , or could you give it away ? Or could you sell it , you know ? Do you want it all ?

And if not , take note of that and write it down . What about your kitchen Cabinets ? I'm someone who , when I moved into this house , like half of my cabinets are empty . In my kitchen I just don't have a lot of stuff anymore and I don't need it , you know . But your pantry , because it neat and organized .

Or is it full of food that is expired , you know ? Or same thing for your refrigerator and your freezer , you know . Take a look in your garage . How many sets of Christmas decorations and things never get used . What else might you have sitting on the garage that has never been touched , not in years , right ? You know ?

I've got all of these Lawn care items and I'm gonna be honest with you , I hired that done . I don't do that anymore . So why do I have the rakes and the little garden tending tools ? Yes , I plant flowers , but that's about the extent of it . So you know , like , what do you have in terms of possessions all in ?

And If you're married and have children , what do they have ? And kind of take note of just the stuff that's sitting around that no one ever touches in those closets ? What ? Have you ever opened up the boxes in the closet since they were packed up ? What's in there ? And do you even want it anymore ?

Like I think some of the more ruthless people are like , if you haven't touched in six months or a year , like it's got to go . I don't know about that , but I would say , like be honest with yourself , like if you don't think you're ever going to use it , get rid of it . You know .

And On that I will say the one thing , because I , having just lost both my parents , I mean , and my siblings and I , were like cleaning out their house and luckily none of us fought over anything or whatever . But we , we took little meaningful things from them and I tried to not take much .

The most Meaningful thing was something I actually bought for them for like five dollars each . They were tiny little refrigerator magnets in the shape of a heart with their name on them , and they had them on their refrigerator for decades .

For decades probably , and except bottom for them , when I was much younger and they were , like you know , not an expensive item . But I took those .

Those were probably the most meaningful thing and they're on my refrigerator and they will be for the rest of my life , because every time I see them I think about all of the fun times with the family , I think about all of the holidays and all of the cooking and entertaining that my mom did in her home and in the kitchen , and I Even think about the memory

of when I found them in the little store . I was in a lake resort . I was much , much younger , with some friends and we there's this big bin and I remember Going through their hunting and I found my dad's name first and then I found I found my mom's name and I thought I'm gonna buy these for my parents .

That memory is is a fun memory with my friends . So that kind of a thing is worth keeping . But it's also not taking up space . It's a , it's a visual memory that's sitting attached to my refrigerator and it every time I walk by and see it it makes me smile . So that's , that's a good possession . But you , the other things that I took ?

There was a brush and a mirror set that my mom always had on her , her vanity , and I thought when I was young it had it has this design on it and I thought it was just Beautiful . You know , when I was little and my siblings didn't want it .

But I remember when I was little I used to take the brush and , like , brush my hair with it , and I thought it was so glamorous and I Took it . But I don't have anywhere to put it , and so what I decided to do was take a picture of it , and I took several of them to make sure I had a good one , and then then I I donated it .

So it's that kind of a thing . It's hard . I think sometimes , when we get rid of things that have a deep emotional attachment to it , we think , if we don't have the thing , that we're somehow Denigrating the memory or we're somehow eliminating the memory . And I'm telling you that's not true .

Like I have it , I have it in my , my one of my scrapbooks now , and you know it's on my phone and I always have the memory when I see it . It gives me the memory , right , so I don't have to have the thing sitting in a drawer , right , I can still have the memory . And the only other thing that I brought into the house is my mom made quilts .

So that was the other very meaningful thing for me is there were two quilts that I bought and I I don't use them on my beds and I don't use them every day , but Very , very , very important to me and it's like that Will also travel with me for the rest of my life , very precious to me . She made it and it's beautiful and it's it's important .

But you know , I'm gonna be honest , there's also drawers and Boxes that I've recently gone through that I'm like why do I have this stuff ? You know so it just didn't make the cut in previous purges but it's time to let it go .

So what I want you to know is that if you have things that have a memory attached to them , just because you might decide to let them go , it doesn't mean the memory goes . You know , take pictures of it , maybe pictures of you holding it or pictures of it just sitting somewhere , and that's sometimes gonna be enough , not always .

Like my quilts , I'm never getting rid of those . Those are very important and those will become heirlooms for my nieces and nephews , you know . So that's what I want to say about possessions is Be honest with yourself about what you use and what you don't use . So that's number one . Number two is people . I so relationships right .

How often in our life are we purposeful about if a relationship is still serving us or not ? And that can seem cold , but you know , sometimes they just don't , sometimes they stop serving us and yet we carry them with us because the person's always been around . And I'm here to tell you that .

I think it's important , when you're doing a life edit December edit to take a look at the people and the relationships in your life and the ones that make you feel good when you spend time with them , and the ones that maybe don't , and take note of that so that you can kind of adjust in the new year the amount of time that you dedicate to that relationship

or that person . Right , it's okay to adjust those things and I think it's actually good , because if you're trying to head somewhere new , not everybody is going to be supportive of that , not everyone's going to want you to do that , not everyone is going to want to come with you when you do that .

And so kind of taking a look and editing your relationships is a good thing to do , I would say , in every respect coworkers , neighbors , church friends you know , long time friends , even romantic relationships .

Sometimes we just get into a habit or maybe we're in a committed relationship , but if we're being honest , the relationship no longer serves us , or where we're going or who we intend to become . So I think it's just important to at least take a look at it and be honest with yourself about the ones that are serving you and the ones that aren't .

And even if you don't want to edit anyone out , you might want to edit the way you spend the time or the amount of time that you spend . So number two is people . Number three is pastimes . So this is about the way you spend your time .

So if your week is a pie , what is that pie allocated to in terms of the way you slice your time right and the way you spend your time ? And I feel like this is where habits can get formed . And if you were really honest with yourself and did a catalog of your time , how much time do you spend scrolling ?

How much time do you spend texting or talking on the phone ? How much time do you spend binge watching your streaming devices ? You know how much time versus like .

How much time do you spend doing things that are going to move your life forward in a meaningful way , maybe spending time with actual people instead of virtual people , or investing in yourself in a healthful sort of way , with self care practices that you could do , or anything about your time .

I feel like a lot of times in this modern world we say we don't have time , but really we're not just not being purposeful with our time and that's maybe not always true it may not be true for you , but I think it's true for many of us is that we have these default patterns of behavior and ways of spending our time and at least 50% or more of it

doesn't serve us , isn't moving us ahead , isn't doing anything really except taking away valuable time , and time is the thing that we can't get more of .

So I think being purposeful with your time and meaningful with your time and making sure that you understand what you want from your life and where you're going , and that you're trying to invest your time in the ways that serve you in every respect , from the people you spend time with to the ways that you are investing in your personal growth or self-care or

things like that it's super , super important . So hobbies , habits , things like that , your pastimes very important to take a look at that and thinking of your work week or your day as a pie and like how are you allocating the slices of pie ? And do you like the way you're doing that ?

Because you can't get that day back , can't get that week back , so invest in your time in a way that is meaningful to you . So that's number three . Number four is points of view . So this is about mindset , and how often do we think about that as something that we can just prune ? I think we don't .

I think we think the thing , the thoughts that we think .

That , which is a lot of what we talk about in this podcast , are just Truths , are just there , there are ever present , companion , but I'm here to tell you that your brain is just a really powerful supercomputer and all of the experiences and all of the things that happen to us in our life we have our filter on that , we have our interpretation of that .

All of those things get stored away and we just keep filling up our hard drive with all of these default things that are automatically stored away .

We're not even aware of it , right , and those points of view , those perspectives , those experiences , they get pulled out when we encounter something similar , right , and a lot of times those points of view are not points of view that are moving you forward . They might be fear-based , they might be overwhelm triggering .

They might they're usually Many times for many of us they could be bad experiences when it triggers self-doubt .

I mean , I think it's important to be aware of what your most common default Thoughts are , and you can do that by just watching and being aware of the thoughts that you're thinking , and even like doing my practice of a daily thought download , where in the morning you're just sitting there and you're giving yourself 15 or 20 minutes and you're just Taking everything

that's in your head , that's , you know those Thoughts that just scroll by and you're putting them all down on the page and then you're just asking yourself Are these thoughts serving me ? We all have them . Neuroscientists that I think it's University of Southern California say we have .

The average human has between 50 and 60,000 thoughts a day , just things that flit by . Your hard drive is full of perspectives , some of which May not be serving you and many of which might be holding you back in some way through fear , through self-doubt and all that stuff .

I'm saying gain some awareness into what that most common thoughts that you have are and Decide to edit those out . You can just decide this doesn't serve me anymore . And when you have that level of awareness , you'll catch yourself During the course of a day thinking the thing , and that's when you can just decide Nope , I decided , I'm not not doing that right .

So this is something that , if you need help , a coach might be helpful with points of view like if you're stuck in self-doubt or if you overthink , or if you get overwhelmed easily , or if you have anxiety , or if you , you know , are stuck in this , I don't know what to do with my life or myself . This is where a coach can help you .

So you can either try the thought download and the self-coaching route . I think it's episode 88 and 89 . You can kind of scroll through my feed . I did two episodes on how to self-coach .

So for this , editing your points of view , if you want to try the self-coaching route , go back and listen to those two episodes , because I describe how to do that and it's a very useful tool .

It can really gain you a lot of insight into what you're occurring patterns of thought are and Give yourself the opportunity to really do some editing and some pruning there going into the new year . So editing your points of view super important and I cannot overstate that enough . Or if you want to talk , you can also go to my Instagram .

Click on the link in my bio and there's a Button you can press if you want to set up a free 30 minute call . No obligation to book anything , no hard sell . I can just give you some thoughts and perspectives .

We can talk about what's Got you stuck or feeling a little stuck , and maybe the advice that I give you can help you get unstuck Moving into the new year . So you've got that option as well . So that's number four edit your points of view . Number five your protocols . So this is really about your habits .

Habits of every type self-care , eating , the morning and evening routines that you follow , what you do to and from your commute to work , ways that you spend your free time . Habits Are the time suck . So this is closely tied to number three . They can be that the time suck in our life . They can also be the thing that gets us to a place .

Unhealthy habits can be the thing that gets us to a place where we're either experiencing health problems or Relationship problems or whatever .

They can be a source of a lot of the root cause a lot of problems in our life because we're not being really purposeful with our habits and we're not Setting up protocols that serve us , like healthy eating protocols , you know , scheduling the time for the workouts during the week and and just doing that the way we would , you know , put on our makeup or take

off our makeup or brush our teeth like it's the same thing . It's like what is that protocol ? Right ? The morning and evening routines , what do you do when you get up ? And how is that easing you into your day in a purposeful way ? How's that setting your day with intention or not ? Right ?

Do you just turn on the news while you're getting ready and fill your head with all those negative thoughts , like I used to do ? I do not do that anymore . I'm very purposeful with it . And you know , what do you do on the drive to the to work ? Are you just listening to music ?

Nothing wrong with that if you're a lover of music , but , you know , could you be at least a couple days a week listening to a podcast or Listening to a book on tape that kind of thing that maybe you don't have time to read where you're sort of filling yourself with new information that can help your life move forward .

So protocols of every type , are important , and I encourage you to Look at all of it . How do you take care of yourself ? How do you get ready in the morning ? How do you put together your outfits ? What are you Doing in terms of your eating ? Are you really intentional about that ?

What are you doing to start your day in a meaningful way and to close out your day in a meaningful way ? What are you doing with your habits ? And where they don't serve you , how could you adjust them so they either free up time or enable you to take better care of yourself ? Things like that . Protocols are very important , and number six is places .

So this is about where you spend your time and , I would say , the roles you take on . So are you somebody who can't say no ? Do you overperform in any area of your life ? Are you not giving your children enough space to kind of make their own mistakes ? Are you really all in on that ? Are you over volunteering at your children's school ?

Are you over volunteering in your corporate life or your business ? Are you being really meaningful with how you fill your day and the places that you go Right with that ? So I think it's also about the quality of the places that you find yourself in your work week and do you like them .

I think environment I must be because I'm a Libra , but like the vibe of a place is super important to me . Like I can't work at a sounds really bad , but it's true . Like the way a corporation takes care of its environment or building is super important to me . Like where I work now is really beautiful .

I have worked at places that are more utilitarian and I think it affects the vibe of a place . So you know your places . The way you're decorating your home , your bedroom , your closet , your office at work , your car , you know . Are you caring for it ? Is it clean , is it orderly ? Is it neat and tidy ? Is it an aesthetic that appeals to you ? Right ?

I think that's really important . The style of a place . Making sure that that evolves as you evolve is an important thing . So I took you through six things that you can take a look at as you do your December edit Possessions , people , pastimes , points of view , protocols and places . I call it the six Ps .

I think if you could do that and spend the next two to three weeks taking a look at those categories and just make notes , make notes in a Google Doc , make notes in a notebook and kind of get really specific with it and reassure yourself when you start to feel overwhelmed .

Or oh , I could never get rid of that sweater that I haven't worn in five years because you know that was a really important sweater . I was wearing that when I met my significant other , or whatever it's like . Take a picture of yourself in it and then let it go .

Having the sweater means nothing really and that might sound like sacrilege and if it does to you , don't get rid of the sweater .

But I'm just saying challenge the thought that if I get rid of it it will get rid of the memory , because that is not true and with all of it it can be really hard to think about letting things go , because you can think about . You know it just feels like a loss , or can feel overwhelming or not like a good idea or whatever .

But I will tell you , like going into a new year carrying a lighter load , there's nothing that feels better than going to the Goodwill or your local charity and giving away gently used possessions that someone else is going to get great joy from but that you haven't touched in like a decade .

You know , it's just , you're not gonna miss it , I promise , and once you get used to doing it , you'll do it regularly .

But I will say , even if you do , we are a society where somehow these things just creep back into our homes and so there's value in making this a regular practice .

And that's why I like to call it the December edit , because I think at this time of year it's about acquiring things , and then we make New Year's be about acquiring new things , and I think too often we don't start that acquiring process by a process of just very purposefully letting things go .

And I think if you allow yourself to take to try it , I honestly think you will find a tremendous value in it and I think it's something that you will do on a regular basis . It feels really good to have a neat and orderly and purposeful life and place and way of being . So with that , I will leave you till next time . Make it a great week .

My friends , do you have a life coach ? If not , I'd be so honored to be your coach . I've created a virtual coaching program and monthly membership called Next Level . Inside we take the material you hear on this podcast , study it and then apply it . Join me at thepurposefulcareercom backslash next level . Don't forget the purposefulcareercom backslash next level .

Join me , and together we'll make your career and life everything you dream of . We'll see you there .