Reducing Clutter for Anxiety Relief

This blog post is coming at you this week from my real life experiences, and how I have been feeling these past few weeks. Anxiety can creep up out of nowhere, and it can be really challenging to find a source. Most of the time, it can come from lots of different places, and sometimes it can feel like it comes from nowhere.

For a few weeks I have been experiencing anxiety, and haven’t really known how to fix it. Anxiety isn’t something that I have dealt with my whole life, or even something that I’ve had much experience with. I think there are a few different sources, which I won’t get into detail here, but I wanted to offer one solution that has helped me ease some of that anxiety.

I think we all know by now that Yoga is much more than the poses that we practice. Yoga asana is definitely a key component, but there are many more that make up what yoga truly is. I’ve been tapping into the Yamas and Niyamas to find a solution, and one that has really helped is Saucha. Small side note here, if you are unfamiliar with the Yamas and Niyamas, I wrote a previous blog post that you can refer back to “Practice and All is Coming”. Okay, so back on track - Saucha is the Niyama that discusses cleanliness. Cleanliness can mean so many different things: keeping the body clean through showering, washing your clothes, cleaning the nasal tract, the digestive tract etc. But, this also means keeping the space around you clean!

Another shocking revelation, the studio is always kept clean - in fact, it might be a slight obsession to keep it so clean. But that means something else has to fall short - and that is typically my home. We have a couple of “hot spots” in our house that tend to be a magnet for clutter. Was it the source of my anxiety? No. But was it helping my anxiety? Still no. Which meant that it needed to be dealt with. So while Aubrey was sick this weekend, we took the opportunity to declutter. These areas included; the pantry, the car, and there’s a corner in Aubrey’s playroom that was wildly out of control. It took time, in fact, it took all weekend. But I feel so much lighter this week.

How are you practicing Saucha in your life? Can you find some time this week and declutter one area of your house? Maybe it’s just one cupboard or one drawer that you always stuff junk into. Take some time to clean it out, and see how it makes you feel.

Namaste,

Sophie.