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Decluttering the Four Rooms: Heart, Head, Home, and Human Connections
38 Plays7 days ago
Ever feel like your life is just one giant junk drawer? The laundry chair, the inbox with numbers too scary to click on, the friendships you keep out of guilt, and the emotions you swear you’ll “deal with later”? That’s clutter—and it’s not just in your house. It’s in your brain, your heart, and even your relationships.
In this raw and honest episode of Exhausted Sparrows Unite, Krista confesses her own clutter struggles (spoiler: the laundry chair makes an appearance) and digs deep into how clutter sneaks into every corner of our lives:
- Emotional Clutter – the grief, guilt, and unspoken feelings that weigh more than any box in the garage.
- Mental Clutter – the tabs in your brain, the invisible load, and why decision fatigue is wrecking your focus.
- Physical Clutter – the piles on the counter that keep cortisol high, mess with your eating, and even steal your sleep.
- Relational Clutter – the draining friendships, the unspoken expectations, and why couples fight about “stuff” more than money.
You’ll hear surprising research, practical tips, and yes, some laugh-out-loud confessions about cheese graters and frozen brain tabs. But more than that, you’ll walk away with permission to let go—of stuff, of guilt, of noise—so you can finally make room for peace.
Because peace doesn’t come from a spotless house or an empty inbox. It comes the moment you exhale and realize: you don’t have to carry all this anymore.
What You’ll Learn in This Episode:
- Why clutter isn’t about laziness—it’s about postponed decisions.
- The surprising ways clutter affects your stress, eating, and even sleep.
- How to start clearing mental, emotional, physical, and relational clutter (without burning out).
- Small, doable habits that make space for peace and rest.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Decluttering Discussion
00:00:04
Speaker
Welcome to Exhausted Sparrows Unite. am your host, Krista Jones, with my beautiful co-host, Chantel Schaefer. And today we are here to talk about decluttering.
00:00:19
Speaker
And I'm not just talking about your kitchen tables. I'm talking about your mind, your spirit, your relationships, all that great stuff.
Personal Clutter Stories and Humor
00:00:26
Speaker
Because here's the truth. My house actually has a desk that doesn't even function as a desk anymore. It's just where all my miscellaneous things go to die.
00:00:37
Speaker
My email inbox has numbers that are so high that it should come with a warning label. And Chantal Schaefer makes fun of me all the time because of it. In my brain, it feels kind of like a hoarder's attic. I'm full of worries and half-finished thoughts and things that I swear I'm going to get through later.
00:00:57
Speaker
So if you've ever looked around your home or your minds or your relationships and you thought, this is too much, I am drowning, you are not alone. I promise you, i am right there with you. And today, we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk how it means to actually clear out all of this clutter, what you see and what you don't.
00:01:22
Speaker
Your inbox makes me twitch. I said to Chantel before we got on air, I go, you are going to love my intro today. And she's like, what part? I go, oh, you're going to know when you hear it.
00:01:36
Speaker
ah So Krista's inbox. And outbox. Has so much stuff. It does. It created its own clutter folder. It did. i don't have that in my email.
00:01:48
Speaker
You do not. I do not. And when Krista goes away, I go into her clutter and I i make it a goal to lead a thousand emails a day. So listen, i i want to defend myself first before we really dive into this. And I want to say this. Yes, the clutter. I mean, i do.
00:02:07
Speaker
I should keep up on that every day. But Chantel makes fun of me because I keep every single email. But how many times Chantel have I said to you... Oh, I remember in 2016, someone wrote me and they needed this. And like, I've searched in my search box and then I am able to get us the email we need You're like a genie.
00:02:33
Speaker
She's like, I think her name was Deb. And then she'll start typing Deb and she'll be like, yup, there it is. It was September 1st, 2016. And Deb said. i know.
Motivation for Decluttering
00:02:43
Speaker
it's at Listen, and it there is a method to the madness. There is a method to the madness. I mean, the clutter part, there is no excuse. I know that.
00:02:51
Speaker
Which is one of the many things. Once I declutter after listening to my own episode, I will feel better about myself. So hello. How are you today?
00:03:02
Speaker
Good. Are you feeling cluttered? I am feeling cluttered.
Mental and Emotional Clutter
00:03:06
Speaker
So I wanted to talk about this topic ah for the obvious reasons because my inbox has 10,833 emails in it.
00:03:14
Speaker
I mean, that's an obvious reason. But as I was kind of researching this over the last few weeks, you know, there's always parts that you and I do in different episodes. And i'm like, oh, we should expand on that more.
00:03:27
Speaker
And a lot of the things that we're going to talk about today, if you've listened to all the episodes, you have probably heard little excerpts of some of this stuff go through. But when I was talking about decluttering and I really started diving into it, I'm like, it really is so much more than just like what is on your office desk.
00:03:47
Speaker
And i was like, yeah, like there are so many different areas that if we really started concentrating on and decluttering, it could bring us peace. And at the end of the day, ah honestly, that's really what all of us want.
00:04:00
Speaker
Are we going to attain it? Possibly not, but we all want it. And so that is our job here at Exhausted Sparrows Unite. Our job is to let you know we are hot messes.
00:04:12
Speaker
We're tired. Sometimes, you know, come in unshowered. And, you know, we just want you to embrace all of your messiness and know that all of us feel this and all of us deal with it. And anybody that tells you that they don't is not being truthful.
00:04:29
Speaker
And we like truthful. We like truthful. We like real. We like real. and And we all have clutter. We have, you know, ah millions of different kinds of clutter. So I want to go into that a little bit before I go into the obvious clutter, which is the clutter that you can see.
00:04:44
Speaker
So emotional clutter, I thought that's a great place to start because that is like all of the stuff we're not dealing with. Like the guilt that we feel, resentment that we feel, um unmet expectations, dreams. Like that is all of the stuff that we just keep burying because we don't want to talk about it.
00:05:07
Speaker
yep And having that emotional clutter right is considered like unfinished business. At least that's what psychologists say about it. um It's like avoidance.
00:05:19
Speaker
And I think a lot of us feel that avoidance and burying it and all of that is going to delete it. right? But it doesn't delete it. It just sticks it way down in there, which means we potentially need more therapy. And I'm not saying this as a joke, but sometimes we need therapy really to get it out because we bury things so far down, we don't even know it's there.
00:05:39
Speaker
So emotional clutter is something that actually activates the same kind of neural pathways, right? That are stress indicators.
00:05:51
Speaker
So without you even realize it, you think you've, you've buried this way down deep, even though you feel that you never think about it, your brain knows it's there.
00:06:04
Speaker
So you are now stressed out and you cannot pinpoint why But it is because of all of this clutter inside of you that you have just buried way down.
00:06:14
Speaker
Yeah. And it just compounds in there. And then you're just putting stuff on top of stuff on top of stuff. And it's, you're gonna, you're gonna explode.
Impact of Emotional Clutter on Health
00:06:22
Speaker
You're gonna explode. Yeah. And therapy is really, i mean, it is a good thing. You know, um we talk about that in almost every episode.
00:06:29
Speaker
Many of us have had it at one point in our life um where we need it and we absolutely should be looking into that. But a Yale study found that people...
00:06:43
Speaker
that have unresolved trauma are 70% more likely to become physically sick. Wow.
00:06:56
Speaker
Physically. So not just emotionally, this emotional stuff, this clutter that we can't seem to get rid of actually affects our health. And they also say that people that take that trauma and journal about it, talk to a therapist about it, you know, um whatever the case may be, somehow get it out, notice significant improvements in their immune function. So your body literally is thanking you when you clean out your feeling closet.
00:07:29
Speaker
Your feeling closet. Yeah. You know those little um people that we talk about? You um have watched the movies. Oh, Inside Out. Yes. that's That's what I think when I hear Feeling Closet, the Inside Out people.
00:07:43
Speaker
So when you clean that out, they say that holding on to negative emotion actually gives you higher rates of anxiety and depression. So cleaning that kind of stuff out helps your mental health.
00:07:57
Speaker
And your physical health. And your physical health. It's amazing how it's all tied together. Like you don't think that suppressing something like a feeling is going to make you sick, but it makes sense. I mean, it probably increases stress hormones, cortisol, adrenaline, and to live in that fight or flight constantly without even probably knowing it.
00:08:20
Speaker
is exhausting. Yes. Right. So you're tired all the time and you don't know why you're tired all the time. There's like a lot of stuff that goes, you know, into that. um Meditation is good. You know, if you think, I don't know that I need therapy, like there's a million different things that you can do. And we're going to get to those because after we identify problems, we always identify solutions.
00:08:41
Speaker
Right. Not that Chantel and I always take our own advice, but you know, it's great.
Managing Mental Clutter
00:08:46
Speaker
So mental clutter is different than emotional clutter. So emotions are all these guilt and all of these feelings and all of this resentment and all of this stuff that is going on.
00:08:58
Speaker
And mental clutter is like, you know, you and I have joked about this. um Mental clutter is like when you have 47 tabs open. Which I cannot handle. No, but I feel that's how I live.
00:09:13
Speaker
Yeah, and I think as as women, it's it's common. And as working women and mothers, it's probably even more common. And we've done episodes where we've called it, I think, The Invisible Load. That was one of our episodes, Mother Guilt.
00:09:28
Speaker
Like, we do a lot of episodes that, um you know, kind of touch on all of this. and And right, especially as a female, there are all these tabs that are open 24 hours a day that, you know, is like you said, you know, in remembering dentist appointments and like all of these silly things that for us give us a lot of different clutter, right?
00:09:51
Speaker
And then that's why we, you know, forget words. Like, we're china like I'm like, can you hand me the, you're like a spoon. um like, yes, the spoon.
00:10:01
Speaker
But like that, that's what that leads to, right? So when I joke, and I know that this is really not a joking thing. This is how... I handle my own stress. But when I joke about things like I feel pre-dementia or something going on, it should make you feel better that a lot of this is because there's just too much mental clutter.
00:10:23
Speaker
I actually started going to the doctor a couple months ago because I'm 50-ish. I could be a little bit older, a little bit younger. I'm just saying 50-ish. um I started going to the doctor a few months ago because I'm really, I'm having a lot of trouble with that kind of stuff.
00:10:39
Speaker
And there's tests that they can do to see, you know, is this dementia, pre-dementia? Is this um just that you have a ah lot on your mind? And just in talking to my doctor for like 30, 40 minutes, I'm like,
00:10:51
Speaker
Um, you know, it was really, ah a relief to hear her say things like, well, Christy, you have to look at all of this that is going on that you have to focus on, which is not giving you the brain capacity for simple things like,
00:11:10
Speaker
naming words, filling in sentences. So mental clutter is a big deal. And sometimes people do think they have dementia, they have Alzheimer's.
00:11:21
Speaker
um When you're in the middle of menopause, another symptom is you have this mental clutter and your brain with all these tabs open just can't process it. So um that is something that we have to deal with.
00:11:33
Speaker
The mental clutter, like what should we hold on to and what can we get rid of? Yeah, so I was reading about something you can do with mental clutter. it's called a brain dump. Have you heard of a brain dump? I'm about to hear about the brain dump now.
00:11:45
Speaker
So you transfer all of your thoughts, all of your worries and ideas and tasks that are going around in your main mind and you put them on paper or digital note without filtering.
00:11:57
Speaker
Don't go, oh, that's not important. No, write it down, put it down. And then you organize them. It's like emptying your junk drawer. You know what? Your junk drawer gets all filled up and all of a sudden you can't open it.
00:12:08
Speaker
And then you take everything out and you organize it and you say, i don't need this anymore. I'm go going to throw this away. I don't need these 57 paper clips that have wound up in here.
00:12:18
Speaker
And you organize them and it just helps free up cognitive space and prioritize what's important. And we all know that I love to check off a list. Exactly. I do. I feel very accomplished checking off a list So just dump it all out there, you're saying. Dump it all out. matter what it is.
00:12:37
Speaker
Doesn't matter. It can be insignificant things, things that you think are insignificant, but maybe that's the point. Because then you're like, this isn't even significant. Yep. Get rid of it, brain. Yep. And you can't organize what you can't see.
00:12:49
Speaker
Well, especially for me, I think people learn differently. i think people were in the middle of a gala here at Sparrows Nest. um We feed people with cancer, if you're not exactly sure what we do and how we got the name and all of that great stuff.
00:13:02
Speaker
um And so we're in the middle of this gala and Chantal and I are doing it right now. We've got all these raffle things coming in and there's all this stuff on paper that people have gotten. And I'm like, Chantal, we have to physically lay it out.
00:13:16
Speaker
I need to see what it looks like. i need to touch it, hold it, feel it, and then let it go. Organize it, let it go. That's how I learn. That's how I process things. So I love that.
00:13:28
Speaker
Right? and don't even have that in my notes. I got you. That should be number one. I got you. That should be number one of all the things that we can do. So, um, all right. So I like that. We do a brain dump when it comes to the mental portion of things.
00:13:43
Speaker
And then we have physical clutter. That's what everybody really thinks clutter is about, right?
Physical Clutter Challenges
00:13:51
Speaker
The physical stuff. And a lot of times when you think clutter, you think, you know, the bills that are on your desk and all of that stuff, or the junk drawer, right?
00:14:00
Speaker
But physical clutter is not just that, but it's everything. It's like in every single room, right? It's it's clothes that you're no longer wearing. There is a woman out there, and I apologize. I did really mean to research this before I got in here too, but she is the one like if you don't touch it, use it, wear it, feel it. Marie Kondo. Is that her name? I believe And she gives you a certain amount of days. I mean, seasonally though, Marie. I mean, I may not wear my winter jacket,
00:14:30
Speaker
For six months at a time. But, you know, she says, if you don't touch it in a certain amount of time, get rid of it. um That's a hard one because then your brain, my brain always goes, well, what if I need this?
00:14:43
Speaker
Because how many times does that happen? You hold onto something for three years. I'm not even kidding to you. It happened to me like three weeks ago. I can't tell you what it was because I had mental clutter, but I know it just happened to me.
00:14:55
Speaker
I threw something on. I'm like, I'm never going to use this. And then it was like a battery for the dogs. I don't even know what it was. And then I needed it That's always how it happens. And that causes me to hold onto things longer so that it doesn't happen again.
00:15:09
Speaker
i hold onto a lot of physical things because I grew up poor. So my mom, you know, gate gives me bowls. i don't even know.
00:15:20
Speaker
This woman must think that I'm cooking 24 hours a day. Shocker. But, you know, she gives me bowls from, you know, my childhood anything. And one, like those are like sentimental things. So i don't want to get rid of that.
00:15:33
Speaker
And two, anytime like I'm given a gift, you know, or I spend the money myself, I'm like, that cost me $35. Yeah. I know there's a crack in that bowl. And if I microwave it, there might be a piece of glass that gets my child's food, but that was $35.
00:15:50
Speaker
Yeah. It's hard to let go of those things. You feel guilty. Yeah. it you're Like you're being wasteful. Yes. So you feel that wasteful. Then there's sentimental value. Like there's all this stuff. And here's the interesting thing.
00:16:02
Speaker
Like I was reading this and I was like, ooh, Americans spend 2.5 days, two and a half days a year looking for their lost items because we have too much stuff.
00:16:23
Speaker
Shout out to my husband who spends two and a half months looking for his lost items. Keys, glasses, remote controls, wallets, clothes.
00:16:35
Speaker
who I can't find my training shirt for the run. And I am the founder of the organization. I don't know where my training shirt is. obviously have too many training shirts and I don't want to get rid of any of the training shirts because I'm like,
00:16:48
Speaker
Oh, remember that time in Nashville? Yes. I can't even fit and have my training shirts. But then I'm like, oh, I'll lose a little bit of weight. Oh, stop. No, but that's true. I'm just saying that's like another reason.
00:16:59
Speaker
But like that was astounding to me that we spend that much time looking for things. And Americans, like they were very specific. And it's because many of us have too much stuff.
00:17:10
Speaker
We live in a very materialistic society. And it's again, it's the keeping up with the Joneses. It's I saw on Facebook. I saw it on Facebook. I have to have it.
00:17:22
Speaker
It's it's a I want to say it's a disease. It's an illness. It's a. No, it is. And my husband, Christian Jones, i mean, love you, dude, if you're listening, but he has it.
00:17:33
Speaker
When for us, when COVID hit, it did something to him mentally. And he then all of a sudden needed stuff because i think mentally he was just a basket case. Right.
00:17:53
Speaker
So we, on the outside of our house, um us and the neighbors, we love our neighbors. We took our, if we ever sell our houses, we're in big trouble. But we took, you know, the lawn that divides us and we made it one big community property. And, you know, um we have picnic tables. We have a huge tiki bar. We call it a tricky bar. It's in the trees.
00:18:16
Speaker
We have a volleyball net. We've got like all this stuff because we said to the kids, You're not going to be inside on your phones. Remember, they were like out of school for a full year. We're like, you are going to be outside. And we created this really, this fun space.
00:18:29
Speaker
But then Christian Jones was like, we need lights. I mean, okay, you don't need 58,000 lights, but he was buying lights in every different color and every different style. And, you know, Halloween lights, purple, and then Mardi Gras lights, green and purple and yellow.
00:18:46
Speaker
And And like, I was like, what are you doing? So for him, there was this, all this physical stuff that he was acquiring through like Amazon because he couldn't go anywhere. He couldn't get anything. Like there was like this spiral. And I was like,
00:19:03
Speaker
enough. We are broke with all the lights that we now have, which is crazy. yeah But we do that, right? So sometimes the physical stuff that we end up getting is because of mental stuff that's going on in our life.
00:19:16
Speaker
We grew up poor, so we had to hoard everything that we have. We you know feel lost. We feel that we need to be in control of something, and that is something we can control.
00:19:29
Speaker
So it's like all of this crazy stuff... Um, and then this whole thing that I read like this 2.5 days, we're looking for our lost scissors. So then we buy three more pairs because we can't, and then we find the scissors because we just have an obnoxious amount of stuff.
00:19:46
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, it happened. You know, it's funny because we were replacing the deck on the back of our house and my husband took off his Apple watch. I don't know why he took off his Apple watch at that point in time.
00:19:58
Speaker
And then we could not find the Apple watch. Which is expensive. It is very expensive. So he went without. So for Christmas, I bought him a new Apple watch. Would you know? No, you found it right after. too After that, we found the missing Apple Where was it? That's what I need to know.
00:20:12
Speaker
It was like in my breezeway. amongst all the So wasn't even on the desk. I mean, on the deck. No. Nope. It was in the breezeway. It was in the breezeway amongst all of the stuff, amongst all of the clutter.
00:20:24
Speaker
And that's what it is too, right? We have clutter in our house. So we've got that kind of clutter in the breezeway, the mudroom, the junk drawer, which honestly we should keep clean. And we'll talk about that because that is a daunting task.
00:20:38
Speaker
It is overwhelming to even find where to start.
The Peace of Simple Living
00:20:42
Speaker
It is overwhelming. And then I think, and there are homes throughout this world that have absolutely nothing.
00:20:51
Speaker
But I think of this simple life. And I think, you know, just recently, you know, I was looking at this mission trip, you know, that I wanted to do. and I'm afraid to go on a mission because I'm afraid I'm going to start another charity, which I know that's not a bad thing.
00:21:05
Speaker
but there are just so many people without anything. And in watching this documentary and how simple they lived, they're also very joyful because they're not, they're not distracted by all the stuff.
00:21:23
Speaker
And that's really what this is. It's a distraction. All the papers on the table, the the scissors, the all of this stuff is a distraction. And living simply is just so much more peaceful. And I know it is.
00:21:37
Speaker
And so, you know, I'm trying to work on that in my life too. It's all of those drawers, but it's all of the clothes you have You know, it's the shoes that you have. It's how many baseball caps do you need or training shirts do you need?
00:21:52
Speaker
And it's really trying to let all of that go. I just did something when I was preparing for this. I threw out my old pans. You know your cookie sheets? Yeah. Like, I know they need to be seasoned, but my husband was like, Krista, these are 25 years old.
00:22:09
Speaker
And I was like, oh. So I went to Sam's Club last week as I was preparing for this. And I finally bought after like 25 years, because I've had them since we've been married. And I think I brought them from my old apartments into marriage. yeah And I bought new pans.
00:22:27
Speaker
Congratulations. Do you have seasoned pans? I do. Like how seasoned? Not that seasoned. I got them from Pampered Chef in the past, i don't know, eight or nine years. Okay. Yeah.
00:22:38
Speaker
Somebody is going to listen to this podcast and say, Krista, that's what you really want is 25-year-old seasoned pan. think it depends on the material. Like cast iron, I'd keep forever. Yeah, I don't have cast iron. But my husband was like, this is just grease that is built up that you cannot even scrub off. I was like, all right, fair enough.
00:22:57
Speaker
He's like, we're eating grease from 27 years ago. I'm like, all right, I'll get new pans. So getting rid of this physical clutter, um it is the easiest to identify. And I think the hardest to get rid of that.
Clutter in Society
00:23:11
Speaker
right? The self-storage industry is worth $44 billion dollars a year in the United States.
00:23:25
Speaker
We are paying rent for our clutter. It is filled with people's clutter. I can't believe just in our small area, how many self-storage places have gone up in the past two or three years. And we have another one going up. Did you see that on 82? If you go down 82 towards Route 9, you got to see this like, like obnoxious.
00:23:46
Speaker
I'm like... I can't even believe there's a need for it. And here's the, this is even scarier. According to the National Association of Professional Organizers, 80% of the things that we keep, we either use less than 3% the time or no, of we use 3% or less. 80% Chantel.
00:24:06
Speaker
eighty percent of what we have we use three percent or less eighty percent chante That's a lot of stuff. This is what we need to do. We ah recording this amazing episode ah over Labor Day weekend.
00:24:21
Speaker
Chantel, over Labor Day weekend, we need to get rid of 50% of the stuff in our house. Let's go. Who is taking my garbage? Because that's a lot.
00:24:33
Speaker
It is. I could let you use one of the trucks here and you could bring it to the garbage place. That's another thing though. I feel guilty over that. Where does that stuff go? That's a podcast in itself and what we're reusing and recycling. and And we can't even get into that.
00:24:50
Speaker
Just write a note that we have to talk about that as well. But 80% of what we're using. So I feel like, all right, if I got rid of 50% of my house, I would be pretty peaceful.
00:25:02
Speaker
No? I don't know. I mean, you could do it though. think If you really were to think this through, 50% of that house you don't use. wow that's I mean, I have a very small house. um' go So this should be easy for you.
00:25:17
Speaker
It should be, but maybe it means I have less stuff. Let's take pictures. Then we can put it up on our Facebook podcast group that we never use and need to start using as well. ah ah I'll show you my yarn clutter.
00:25:31
Speaker
Is that a thing though? Because i feel i feel you could keep that and then be like, I can just make a mishmash of colored blankets. That's the problem right is that I never have enough of one yarn to make something. So then I buy more.
00:25:43
Speaker
So it is a problem. it is ah It is a big problem. And there's a lot of people like scrapbooking and stuff. Like if that's your thing, like I've seen that kind of stuff and I don't get that. But um I have a clutter problem, ah if if we want to call it that, with toilet paper and paper towels and all of that now because of COVID.
00:26:02
Speaker
Like, honestly, I have to have like two industrial family packs with like three of us living in the house at all times. And then Christian will tease me and go, ooh, you just dug into one of the two packs. And then like, he thinks it's funny. And then I'm out at Sam's Club buying a whole new pack.
00:26:16
Speaker
It's bad. See that I never, I went through the Lysol wipes because he couldn't get them. Yeah. And it made me panic. I never had an issue finding. had toilet paper? We were not friends then. If we were good enough friends, it would have been like, I need some.
00:26:28
Speaker
Yeah, i order um I order from Grove. I have a subscription. I don't even know what this means. it's Yeah, it's bamboo toilet paper. Very sustainable. Okay, so we are going to do a podcast on good things for the earth.
00:26:39
Speaker
There we go. And we are going to do a podcast, I think, on all these cool, fun software apps, all these different apps that can make our life more efficient. There we go. Like, I don't know what you're talking about with Grove. What is that? Grove.
00:26:50
Speaker
Oh, Grove. understand. Well, we'll talk about it in that podcast. I think we will. I think this is going to be good. So I saw this meme and I was like, ouch. And the meme said, my clutter isn't hurting anyone unless you count myself.
00:27:04
Speaker
Oof. Because really that's all that your clutter is hurting is yourself, right? Your emotional clutter, everything that you've buried, your mental clutter, the 500 tabs that are open, your physical clutter, you're looking at it every single day and you might not be cognizant of it, but but but you are looking at clutter. and You're walking into clutter. I say this in a couple of podcasts because I do talk about the fact that I have attention deficit disorder And any any clutter completely messes up my day.
00:27:35
Speaker
It really does. I don't get as much done when, even if I'm not recognizing the clutters there, somewhere in my subconscious, it knows. And my day is definitely not as efficient.
00:27:46
Speaker
Well, it's distracting. Yeah. You know, something catches your eye and then you're moving on to the thing. people. Yeah. because i squil Squirrel. Squirrel. That's what it is. All right.
Relational Clutter
00:27:57
Speaker
Relational clutter.
00:27:59
Speaker
We've talked about this on a couple podcasts. um But honestly, it is like the emotional junk drawer of your connections. It's like friendships that you've outgrown but you keep.
00:28:13
Speaker
It's toxic people, family members, friends, coworkers, passive aggressive stuff. It's all of that stuff. That is a big deal, right?
00:28:27
Speaker
We, a lot of times, don't let go of that because of guilt, especially if it's like family and stuff, you know? um and it shows up everywhere, right?
00:28:40
Speaker
It creates more mess in relationships in our life that are important, right? So holding on to all of that ick and all of that toxicness is actually, it causes problems in our marriage and it causes problems in how we deal with our children and because somewhere else in our life, we've got these relationships that we really shouldn't be holding on to. We really need to let go.
00:29:02
Speaker
and and And for me, this is probably the hardest area to address. letting go of a relationship is tough, especially somebody that might've been with you for your life.
00:29:16
Speaker
Sure. But you know, what I think brings me peace is I'm getting older and Chantel, like I was in that place too. um you know, i have 10 years on you.
00:29:28
Speaker
I feel that I was absolutely like that. But then I realized as I got older that relationships aren't always, some are really supposed to be there for a season and it may be a really long season. Like it could be, you know, a 30 year friendship, but you know, as you grow, other people may not, or you may grow different ways and it has to be okay.
00:29:51
Speaker
it The relationship can absolutely serve a purpose, but there, you have to be honest with, you know, when it's over, you know, if it's not serving you anymore and it's really not bringing you light, then honestly, like it's really just cluttering you. It's holding you back.
00:30:08
Speaker
Yeah. And it's something that you're right. it is one of the hardest things to do. um And I've lost relationships that were really, really important to me. And it's really, really hurtful. But, you know, at the end of the day, sometimes I always say God needs to scoop that out so he can bring something else even better in.
00:30:28
Speaker
And sometimes, you know, he's hearing conversations behind closed doors that they're saying about us that we have no idea, you know? So I think it's okay and it's healthy.
00:30:41
Speaker
And sometimes when I think a relationship is coming to an end, i will just put some more boundaries on it. And it will kind of maybe fade out on its own. And I don't have to have some difficult conversation.
00:30:53
Speaker
I'm just not really answering the phone as much. And they're not really texting as much. And, you know, it just kind of like, you know, that's the best kind of friendship. The ones that just, you know, fade into the sunset, like the wild, wild west.
00:31:04
Speaker
Like... See later. Not that they all do that. You just painted a beautiful image. Thank you. Thank you. But psychologists say that relational clutter drains your energy as much as ah physical activity.
Managing Relational Clutter
00:31:22
Speaker
It is that cortisol as well, right? It's that fight or flight because you're always on edge. You're always nervous. You're always feeling guilty. You're empathetic. You're wondering what you've done wrong. You're wondering if you've done enough.
00:31:34
Speaker
So those kind of relationships in your life are are things that you... you you have to You have to cut off. One in four adults say they stay in a relationship um that is more draining than supportive because guilt is easier for them than being honest.
00:31:56
Speaker
Ouch. They just stay in the relationship because they're afraid to hurt somebody's feelings. And that's not healthy. No. But a UCLA study said that your hormones spike.
00:32:09
Speaker
in those type of relationships and your cortisol levels, you know, they increase. And then you're always in this state of manic panic and you don't really know what's going on, right? You don't know why, but that's part of the issue. We have to reevaluate our relationships and family. Listen, family ones are probably the hardest for sure, right?
00:32:34
Speaker
Because you can pick your friends. You can't pick your family. But certainly you can create boundaries and you can figure out what you need to do for your own mental health. Yep.
00:32:46
Speaker
So, yeah. That's what I got for you today. That was deep. I'm sorry. I feel sometimes we get a little deeper into other times, but you know, I only do it because I love you.
00:33:00
Speaker
You ended with the hard stuff. It was like ending with the burpees today at the gym. Yeah, those were bad. That was emotional burpees. Those were emotional burpees because clutter isn't like you're lazy. I think it's important that you realize these are postponed decisions and unspoken boundaries and a nervous system. That's just your nervous system is crying out for relief.
00:33:21
Speaker
So every time you clear a drawer or you close a tab in your mind or you renegotiate a relationship, maybe you don't break it off, but you renegotiate, you put it in a pile, a file, right?
00:33:34
Speaker
That is what can bring you peace. Remember that peace doesn't always arrive in a spotless home. It doesn't need to. But peace is showing up when you finally realize that you need to live with less noise.
00:33:50
Speaker
And you, my friend, deserve it.
Closing and Charity Promotion
00:33:53
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Exhausted Sparrows Unite with Chantel and I. If you want to learn more about our charity, you can go to our podcast, ah Exhausted Sparrows Unite, which you're on right now.
00:34:06
Speaker
Our website is sparrowsnestcharity.org. And remember, until next time, be kind to yourself and each other.