It's Time to Hit Reset or Refresh

Feeling stuck in a rut? Struggle no more, as this episode is your ticket to pressing the reset button on your life. With my patented Sunday reset day and a life-changing quarterly audit, complete with the Venn diagram exercise from my Be MindfullJournal, I'll guide you on how to take stock and make the necessary tweaks—or sometimes a complete overhaul—to live the life you've always dreamed of. This isn't a mere checklist; it's about taking radical responsibility for the direction your life is heading and ensuring you're on the path to joy, growth, and fulfillment. 

Transform your living quarters into a sanctuary that mirrors your essence and supports your peace of mind. I'll share with you my own rollercoaster journey through numerous moves, and how I've crafted spaces that truly resonate with my identity, as seen in my viral TikTok and YouTube transformations. Discover how an environment that aligns with who you are can significantly enhance your well-being, and learn why orderliness and style are more than just vanity—they are vital commitments to a lifestyle that lifts you up every single day.

 I'll recount how shifting from superficial tidying to embracing the 'reset' has not only decluttered my space but also my mind. It's surprising how simple changes like reorganizing a closet or opting for ambient lighting can transform your space from chaos to comfort. For those feeling the burden of disarray, I'm here to share practical steps to start with manageable updates that can dramatically boost your mental clarity and personal productivity. So come along, and let's spark joy and functionality in our homes, reflecting the ever-evolving journey of our lives.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

Hey guys, and welcome back to that Girl Radio. It is your lovely host here, ricky Lee, also known as that Girl, and you are tuned in to your weekly supplement to help you live and design your dream life. For today's episode, we are going to discuss how you can hit reset or refresh this month to help you realign yourself to accomplish your goals this year. And I think this is very timely because it's officially March, it's March 2nd, and I'm so excited because tomorrow is my Sunday reset day, where I get to realign myself, meal prep, go, take my workout class and just get myself ready for the week. And one thing that has been so refreshing through and through is every Sunday getting to reset. That is the one day where I can truly regain my sanity, and so I want to talk to you guys about turning resetting and refreshing to not only just a one time a week ritual, but into a mindset and a mind frame that you are going to embody for the entirety of the month of March, because, as you know, quarter one ends at the end of March. You have just about a month to get everything together before quarter two starts. So during the third month of every quarter is when I like to do my life audit.

Speaker 1: 1:35

For those of you who are new to the podcast, let me give you a little bit of some background. I'm Ricky Lee and I redesigned my dream life in a matter of 60 days. I did that back in 2022 and since then, I've been helping thousands of women do the same. And one of the favorite things that I have done throughout my journey because obviously we know that the journey to becoming is everlasting I continuously go back to the drawing board and conduct a life audit every quarter to assess how I'm feeling about my life, because it's so easy to just go through the motions and just be like, okay, like I'm going to work, I'm going to school, I'm friends with this person, I'm in a relationship with this person, and never really take notice of how you are feeling about those things. We may weigh the pros and the cons of the scenario, but negate any of our feelings that are attached to it, and this is going to empower you to take autonomy over your life and take radical responsibility for the fact that you pave your own path. How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. So, because we are radically responsible women and also women of progress. We conduct a life audit every quarter to get ourselves back on track by establishing guardrails to keep us on the path to achieve our goals.

Speaker 1: 3:04

So this looks like doing a Vendaya Gram exercise. After you've listed out all of the things that you're involved with, whether that be your career, your relationships, your friendships, your environments, your apartment, you list out all of the things that are current factors in your life, right, and you will categorize them according to what feeling is attached to it Does it bring you joy, does it bring you pain, or does it bring you growth? You can do this exercise inside of the Be Mindful Journal that is available on my website, therickyleecom slash shop. I will have it linked in the show notes for you all to grab, but this is the perfect exercise to do in the month of March, as you are starting to hit reset or refresh, because it is so important to take heed on how things are making you feel. To live and design your dream life is to be the co-writer with God, of course and the architect of the blueprint for your success, right, and that looks like going back to the drawing board and saying, okay, this isn't working. Why isn't it working and what tweaks can I make to make it more effective? And when you're doing that, you start to see what do I need to start cleaning house with? You know Housemeaning your mind. That's your forever home, right? Your mind is your forever home that you have to live with and we wanna clean that out. Spring cleaning is often thought of as just cleaning your baseboard window screens or like clearing out your basement, but the type of spring cleaning that I want to implore you all to do today is a very deep clean of your mind and a reset and refresh of what you are going to do to help you live your best life.

Speaker 1: 5:00

Now, before we get into all of the spring cleaning tasks for the month, I must define the difference between a reset and a refresh. Okay, not everything necessarily has to be reset. Some things can be just refreshed. So the way you can distinguish between the two is that something that requires a refresh is just it has a minor issue and can be solved through a little maintenance, a little restoration, a simple conversation. Those sort of things are quite minor and you could probably easily put $20 towards making it better. $20 is the incremental value that we can attach to something being able to be refreshed versus reset.

Speaker 1: 5:46

Now, obviously, in some instances, things are going to require a bit more money and those are investments that we can choose to make. However, that's like the constant breaking point for me is like, if I can't spend $20 to $50 to fix it, then okay, let's go back to the drawing board and let's figure out how we can reset it. So reset it means it's a dub babe, like you couldn't even put $20 towards it. Improving it to start to spark joy. We really need to get to the root of the issue, and that looks like just completely doing away with it and starting from ground zero and building something else, and that's okay. What I want you guys to realize is that in life, you have multiple lives. It's okay to literally bulldoze everything that you built thus far and decide today that you want to build something different, because that's the beauty about being a woman of progress.

Speaker 1: 6:48

At any point, you can say, hmm, I'm going to close the chapter of this book and I am going to rewrite my story, and you know what? I'm gonna reset everything Like bump refreshing things. I've tried refreshing things. I've tried. New hair, I've tried a new style. I've tried you know reading my word, like I've tried all of that, I've tried all of the little minor things and none of that is working. This is like a deep thing, this is a core thing, this is a belief thing, and I need to get to that and reset. And once you are able to delineate what the cure could be to your current problems, then you'll be able to take the right course of action. But, first and foremost, I want you to grab your nearest pen and paper, because we're gonna do a little fun exercise and you are going to investigate the grounds. Okay, this is very similar If you were like an architect coming on to this land where you guys are going to build this massive empire. Okay, you've gotta investigate the grounds to make sure that it is literally set up good, there's no problem, there's nothing present that is going to cause any issues down the line when you're building this empire, right? So you're gonna investigate the grounds that you're currently living in, you're home, even if you're living in a dorm.

Speaker 1: 8:14

I want you to investigate all of the different spaces that are within this one room that you occupy and I want you to assess the state of each room or space you often use. Is it in poor, good or excellent condition. Because once we've completed the life audit, guys, we know what's bringing us joy, what's bringing us growth, what's bringing us pain. It's evident Anything that's bringing us pain, we're doing away with it. Anything that's bringing us joy and growth, we're trying to find more ways that we can invite those opportunities into our lives. Right, but the number one problem that I find a lot of people have is not necessarily their mindset, but their space, because your space is a reflection of your subconscious mind and I want you to make sure that it's an alignment with your conscious mind. Okay, so we're gonna fix that with this. So once you've got your pen and pad and you're walking around in your space, I want you to start in your common areas, like your living room, your office, and look around and ask yourself is it in poor, good or excellent condition? And I will explain which each of those conditions are.

Speaker 1: 9:29

Poor, meaning it is hard for you to find joy, relief or purpose within this space. It is hard for you to find items that you need within this space. The space feels overwhelming at times or underwhelming. It just doesn't really speak to who you are as a person. It's just serving its function. It's a living room, it's an office, it's a bathroom, it's a bedroom, it's just. It is what it is, but it's not something that you find joy, purpose or true meaning in it. If you're in that space and you feel like it's good, that means the space functionally is working, but it doesn't entirely reflect your style. You don't feel inspired in this space. It cluttered but it's easy to find relief in. You know like there are some miscellaneous items that are put in places that should have a home but they don't. But it's working. It's working. It's not driving you crazy, it's cool. Now moving on to excellent, excellent means. It is easy to find joy, relief or purpose within this space. You can easily find items that you need and the space inspires you. It is a direct reflection of the person you desire to be and it feels like a safe haven or an oasis. So if I were to walk into my bedroom right now, I would say that this feels like an oasis for me.

Speaker 1: 10:55

I have built in each zone of this room spaces where I feel like I can thrive. When I go out into my living room, I can say the same thing. When I go into my kitchen, I can say the same thing, but for a long time, when I would go into my bathroom, which is supposed to be my safe haven. This is the place where I indulge in self-care, this is the place that I go to first thing in the morning. This is the first room that I interact with is my bathroom. It was cluttered. There's so much products everywhere. I feel like everything is busting out the seams because I have just so much stuff and I didn't like my shelving. I felt like everything just was everywhere and it made it really hard for me to show up for myself, because every time I would go into my bathroom I would be met with the thought of my space being a mess.

Speaker 1: 11:50

And so many of you can relate to this because you love your life, you love yourself, but when you look around you, you're confused because you feel like these things just don't really match who you are as a person. It doesn't align with the places that you're trying to go, and you're kind of confused because you don't know what to do. And hopefully today's episode on resetting or refreshing can help you find the tools or the necessary steps to like, spark joy within these spaces so that you can thrive, because sometimes all we need to do is just make a choice and say you know what? I'm tired of living like this. Let me make a difference. And sometimes the difference doesn't have to cost a thing. Sometimes the difference just costs setting time aside on a Friday, saturday or Sunday when you're off of work, and saying, for two hours I'm gonna dedicate my time to this project of this room and or the space, and we are going to declutter it so that we can start to provide meaning to the space, so that I can start to find joy, relief and purpose within the space, and so that this space can truly reflect the person that I desire to be. Because I learned this exercise very, very young.

Speaker 1: 13:12

As someone who has lived in 11 different houses and three different spaces throughout college, it was so imperative for me to craft a space that I could be comfortable in, that was my safe haven, that, after all of the woes of the day and all of the craziness, I could come back to this space and just woo-saw. And I find that when I go into spaces and it's not exactly comfy, like it makes me anxious, like sitting on furniture, that's like really hard when I go out places or like you know, being in rooms that are really cold, like all of that has an effect on me, and a lot of us are easy going, like I'm easy going, I'm not gonna complain about it, but I do notice those things, and so for me in my home, it is so important for me to take notice of the little things so that when I do lie my head down, I feel like I'm at peace in my space and I'm not like just looking around like I'm home, like I'm here, but it doesn't really reflect who I am. Because, I'll tell you this, when you have a space that reflects who you are, you are more likely to stay in alignment. And I'll give you an example I'm in my space right now. Guys, you know my space is definitely Ricky Lee and that girl coded Like that is what I'm known for In 2021,.

Speaker 1: 14:39

I went viral on TikTok for my dorm transformation. I've also gone viral on YouTube for my apartment transformation and I'm just big on transformation, transforming things to be a physical embodiment of my spiritual and my internal and like just all of my qualities. Right, and when I've been in spaces where I haven't been feeling like myself, I promise you, my space doesn't look like myself. It starts to look crazy. Things are just so unhinged Desk, all of my surfaces are just cluttered with so much stuff, you know, like clothes are everywhere. Everything is just like bursting out the seams, very similarly to whatever is happening in my mind. And when you craft a space where everything has a home or everything serves a purpose and everything sparks joy, it is so much easier for you to walk through your space and interact with the things in your space with meaning, every single day, to help you along the way.

Speaker 1: 15:49

Just this past Friday, I decided that I was not going to continue living the way that I did for much of February. For the latter half of February, my home was in shambles. Guys, like in shambles and I don't say that and mean it lightly, like when I say my home was in shambles. It was in shambles and because of this I had done a bit of travel. During the month of February I had a lot of different content deliverables.

Speaker 1: 16:17

I was a G as an influencer and I just had a lot of responsibilities for school that was taking me away from being able to take care of my home and because of that I wasn't taking care of myself, because it became harder and harder for me to do my routines in a messy space. How am I supposed to do my skincare and all that? And my whole entire counter is covered with so much product and hair tools and skincare and it's just like I can barely find things and like, think clearly and close out the wazoo like four hampers full, and I'm trying to dress for the day because I feel like life is the occasion. So I'm taking on that lifestyle change this year of getting dressed every day and I have limited options at this point because we have four baskets full of laundry, girl. Like you know, now we're pulling out things we haven't seen in years out of the closet because we're down to the special teams items of clothes. I don't even know why this is even still in my closet.

Speaker 1: 17:25

So I say all of that to say you make it hard for yourself to be your best self when your space is cluttered, because when your space is cluttered, babe, that means your mind is cluttered, right, and cleanliness is the closest thing to godliness and that is one thing that I am like really learning to appreciate as an adult. I am someone who is like a Hollywood cleaner I tidy things up but I never really do a deep clean. I never really do a true reset. I do a lot of refreshing of things. I will refresh your space. I'll be like I don't really love these pillows, I don't really love this chair, let me find something new that will spark Joanna's space. I'm all for refreshes. However, I never truly do a reset, because to reset something is to really require a lot of emotional investment and it requires for you to be decisive right. To refresh something is to just be like okay, today I'm going to buy these new pillows, today I'm going to get this new organizer, and if it doesn't work today, then I have the option sometime down the line to invest in something else to fix the problem. But there's only but so many refreshes we can do. The rule of thumb is to refresh once and if it doesn't do what it needs to do for you, then you do a reset.

Speaker 1: 19:03

So for me, I did a refresh of my closet display and this brought me so much joy, guys, and let me tell you why. I love my purses of my perfumes and my jewelry and I needed to find a way to spark joy and my morning routine of getting ready, because if I'm going to take on a lifestyle of getting ready every day right. I have to find ways to make this experience an experience right. It's for those of you who want to take on cooking every day. You have to make your space in your kitchen an oasis. You have to make it extremely homey and like world class, with maybe at least one nice knife you know, or invest in like a really good cuisine arts cooking tool, like whatever it is that you really like to do. If you really like soups, then you can get an emulsifier, or if you really like to bake, you can get a mixer, or if you really are on your health and wellness kick, you can get a really nice juicer. But like finding ways to insert the joy into the routine, because that is how you start to live your best life.

Speaker 1: 20:24

I don't want to preach that materialistic things are what's going to bring you joy, because by all means that is not the case. But the things that we see are have an effect on how we feel. And if you were to go into your kitchen every day and you're going to cook and you just see all these like old, dirty pans and there's really no exciting new recipes, Like you don't have a new recipe book that you can go to for inspiration. You have no cooking utensils or tools that bring you happiness. It's going to be really hard to get into the routine of cooking for yourself. Same thing for getting ready in the mornings. If your closet is a mess, you can't find anything ever. It's really hard to acquire new things because there's nowhere to put them. It makes it hard for you to find joy and getting ready in the morning. Same for your bathroom. It's really, really hard for you to find joy and getting ready in the mornings when your bathroom is not calming, it's not relaxing, it doesn't give the vibes of a space that you would want to get ready in.

Speaker 1: 21:36

And this is why we have to say to ourselves okay, do I want to hit the reset button or do I want to hit the refresh? And, as I said before, the rule of thumb is refresh once. If it doesn't do what it needs to do, then let's do a reset. So I just refreshed my closet display. I shared it on my TikTok. If you guys aren't following me on TikTok, make sure to do so. It's the Ricky Lee. It's gotten quite a lot of views and it's inspired a lot of women to reset and or refresh their closet displays.

Speaker 1: 22:08

And I would say that this is not a reset project because I didn't go out and have to acquire all new things to put into this space, meaning like the items, the functional pieces that are being shown off. I didn't have to buy new bags, new jewelry, new perfumes or anything like that. I already had those things. I just refreshed the presentation of those things to make it spark joy. So this is why this is more of a refresh project. But in this project I acquired new acrylic shelves, I got some handbag holders and then I got a couple more like items like ambient lighting that is motion-sensored and it just makes it look like a really beautiful boutique display in my bedroom and it just makes me so happy to get ready in the mornings. But this little refresh project that costs me no more than probably a hundred bucks has completely altered my morning routine, because I now really enjoy getting dressed and just imagine if I was to insert a slice of joy into every space in my home, just how more aligned I would be with my goals, because it's easier for me to show up for myself. That's the whole goal with resetting or refreshing. Right Is to get yourself so in alignment that it's easier for you to show up for yourself For my kitchen.

Speaker 1: 23:38

This past January I invested in a whole new 60-piece meal prep kit from JC Penney on their website and I think it was like 50-something bucks the best money I've ever spent. Every meal prep kit I've ever purchased before had maybe 16 to 20 pieces in it, so it was really rough to prep breakfast, lunch and dinner in the containers and then, when it's time to prep again, have enough because some of them are dirty, obviously to sustain me for the following week. But because this meal prep kit has over 60 pieces, it's made it so easy for me to get up and prep breakfast, lunch and dinner for four days at a time and it's given me better habits throughout the week to just show up for myself. That's one less decision I have to make every day is what I'm gonna eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And when I did that consistently for the first, like six or seven weeks of the year, I felt the best I've ever felt.

Speaker 1: 24:42

And when I fell out of that routine because of travel and so many other obligations on the other side of that, I just felt lost and I was just like my home was falling apart. Everything was just so messy because I didn't have a routine or structure for myself, because it was just a mess, and so I don't want you to get to the point where you don't do the deep things, you don't do the small things to assess and reflect on what's happening, which then ends up causing you to burn out by month four of the year. We've got big goals that we set in January. Right, we did a lot of work on ourselves, on our spirituality, and like there's no reason why we have to take 20 steps back. And I feel like the reason why I always take steps back is because my space is a mess and I know that that's so small, but I keep saying this your space is a reflection of your mind.

Speaker 1: 25:47

You can't clean every day. When you have 19,000 obligations that you have to check off, the last thing you're worrying about is cleaning up. You just wanna lay down, and when you have the attitude, day in and day out, you're gonna look around and your house is gonna look like hoarders. So this is why we do the quarterly hitting of the button of reset or refresh on everything in our lives, so that we can figure out. Okay, how do I take back the reins and reestablish the guardrail so that I can thrive? And for those of you who aren't type A, maybe this isn't necessary, but for me and all my other type A girlies, this helps us thrive. This truly is a beautiful tool set that gives us the freedom to just float through every day, because we have spaces crafted that have purpose and meaning. Every single thing has a home, and so, for the people who did their walkthrough of their space and they assessed every room, for any room that had a poor assessment, you need to start thinking of what ways you can start to bring more functionality into the room and also more joy into the room.

Speaker 1: 27:11

Functionality comes through organizational tools decluttering, getting rid of things that you no longer use, donating things you no longer use and making sure that you place items in spaces where they are most likely to be used. I know and I love my mom, but in so many instances she's come and helped me move into places and she will organize things according to what makes sense to her, and that's fine and dandy, but the way in which I do things because I'm four foot 11, like there's so many different things that have to be taken into consideration. That makes the way I organize things much better for me, because, after all, this is my space. So for those of you who find yourself in a space where you didn't organize things, take on the project of like just reorganizing things in your space according to how often you use them and how readily accessible you need things to be. Obviously, I'm not gonna have something that I don't use as often in my top drawer. We're probably gonna move that down. Obviously, I'm not going to have my chair next to my bed. If I don't ever find myself needing to use that extra seating in my bedroom, I might place it out in my office or in my living room so I have another piece of seating when I wanna just read a book out in my common area. Like just finding ways to refresh my spaces so that they are more suitable and functional for me.

Speaker 1: 28:47

Another thing that you can do is bring that joy into the room by finding new decor pieces. Like if you feel like you're looking around and your space does not reflect the woman that you are or the woman that you are becoming, start small. You don't have to buy new furniture. Obviously that's like a really big reset thing If you're refreshing your space. You can start with pillows. You can start with your Duvet Comforter they are very cheap on Amazon. They are amazing. You can swap them out, kind of figure out what's gonna work. Buying new lamps it's always a great way to start and finding little knickknacks to decorate all of your surfaces. Those are great ways to start to revamp a space and also curtain. If you have smaller windows, that's a really cheap way to bring in different color schemes with pillows, curtains and then the little knickknacks that go into your surfaces like any sculptures, clocks, things like that. That can be a really cheap way to refresh your space and bring in the joy that you want.

Speaker 1: 29:54

And if you really wanna get deep, look into color psychology. Look into what different colors mean and what they elicit. I know there has been this soft life aesthetic going around all over the internet and I am someone who partakes in it, like my home definitely is beige, browns, blacks and creams. However, look into what other colors elicit, like yellow, orange, green, blue, and figure out what type of emotions do you wanna feel in your space and start bringing lots more of those colors into your space, like do not be color blinds and like, unwilling to bring any of that into your space, cause I think we're robbing ourselves of opportunities to have slices of joy by not incorporating color into our homes. So don't be afraid to do that just because it's not popular right now. You be the wave, you be the curve and start to incorporate color into your home.

Speaker 1: 30:55

I will say if it's not a space thing, if it's like you don't feel like your home is necessarily the problem, but it's your routines, then start to ask yourself like what things should you stop doing? What habits do you have that's making your space look a little bit more cluttered, even though you love it and figure out you know what are you gonna stop Like? For me, I need to stop taking off my shoes in my living room, because by the end of the week I'm putting five and six pairs of shoes back into their respective places, and that's like one small thing that I can do to keep my space fresh throughout the week. Another thing I can do is stop waiting until I have four baskets full of laundry to do my laundry and then complaining because everything is everywhere. I can instead choose a couple of days out of the week to do laundry, to start a load in the morning before class so that I have another reason to get out of bed. One and two, I can keep my floors clean, because when you have a basket on the floor full of clothes, it just automatically makes your space look janky.

Speaker 1: 32:06

And then, after you've thought of the things that you can stop to help you keep a tie to your space, which also will help you keep a tie to your mind then start to think about what things can you start doing to also keep a tie to your space and a tie to your mind. Those two coincide. But if it's not a habit that you don't already have and this is something that you wanna start, like maybe meal prepping or being a plant mom, if you want to start, I can't think of anything else that you might wanna start. But just think of different things that you can start to help making your space come alive and be more in alignment with the woman that you wanna become. And then also figure out ways that you can have it stacked Like. If there are certain things that you feel like you need to start but you don't know how. Think about the things that you do on the daily. Do you watch TV every week.

Speaker 1: 32:58

I know for me I'm gonna be watching BMF every Friday. So on Fridays now in the morning I'm gonna start a load of laundry and by the evening I should have put everything in the dryer and had a load that's dry and I'm going to do my laundry while I'm watching BMF, and that's a way for me to have it stacked Like. I'm looking forward to BMF every single Friday. But I'm now going to reset at that time and I'm gonna do my laundry, put everything away, so that when I go into the weekend I have a clean and blank slate. I have a closet full of clothes that I can pick out from and figure out what I'm gonna wear, and that puts me right on track for, at the start of the week, being able to also have a plethora of options to pick from when I'm getting ready in the mornings. So that's just one example, but there are plenty of other ways that you can have it stacked as well.

Speaker 1: 33:51

Now I really do hope that you guys found today's episode on hitting reset or refresh this month so that you can re-establish the guardrails for your life. Look, when you have a clean home, you have a clean mind, and that is what's most important. I feel like your mental health is something that should be treated dangly, and the way that you treat it is by treating your space and all of the things that you own and engage with with the utmost care, and that looks like resetting things, refreshing things and constantly coming back to the drawing board to provide a systems for yourself that can allow you to thrive, and so I hope today's episode was helpful for someone, and if you guys found today's episode helpful, make sure to leave a rating for the podcast wherever you listen. It really does help and it helps push out the podcast to more women like yourself who are looking to live and design their dream life. If you're not already following the podcast on Instagram at that girl radio, make sure to do so.

Speaker 1: 34:57

We have weekly content that we're posting in regards to the episodes, and we even have a series on our Instagram stories called let's Chat, where you can chat with me and we can just talk about other ways that you like to reset and or refresh on the day to day. If you're not following your host here, rikki Lee, what are you doing? You can find me on Instagram at rikkileeco. You can also find me on TikTok at the Rikki Lee and on YouTube at Rikki Lee TV, where I drop episodes weekly to show you how to live and design your dream life. I love y'all and I will catch you next week. Music Playing painted out learner voice surface view ° ° cultivate.