211. Spring Cleaning Procrastination and Letting Go of Mental Clutter

Why do we/I procrastinate and how can we overcome it and actually take action and make progress on our goals whether that's decluttering, getting clear on our finances or start a new project (once Mercury goes direct) ? 

I share with you what I found out about myself and what I think the solution can look like. You want to tune in and found out what Matthew McCaughnegy has to do with my solution and why it's important. 

From Chaos to Peace Consulting Inc - https://connygraf.com

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Well, hello, my friend. Welcome to the podcast. How are you doing? Thank you so much for allowing me back into your ears, if you listen to this in time when it's released, on April 8, 2024,.

Speaker 1: 0:17

Today is the new moon eclipse in Aries and we have seen a lot of hype around this eclipse, right, even warnings to better stay home that day, and I thought it was all a bit over the top and cuckoo. But then today today is Sunday, a day before this eclipse something really crazy happened to me. So I'm standing at my bathroom sink washing my hands and then the sink explodes. And I'm standing at my bathroom sink washing my hands and then the sink explodes. And I'm not even joking, I mean literally the sink exploded. I have one of these on the counter bowls and I was washing my hands and the next thing, I know, it just kind of exploded in a thousand pieces and it turns out it was made from glass, so I didn't drop anything into it, I was literally just washing my hands. So the only thing that touched the sink was the water. Right, my God, I didn't see this coming and I was just literally in thousand pieces and I was really shocked. And then I'm looking around. I'm just standing there, not even moving, and I'm just looking around and I have glass pieces in all different sizes all the way over into the shower even, and I don't even know how they got there, I mean literally. And then, standing there kind of trying to get my composure back, um, get my composure back, um, I realized I was very lucky that I wasn't hit with one of these glass pieces in my face or in my eyes, holy moly. I mean, I got a little scratch on my finger when I was cleaning up all this glass, but other than that I'm fine. But I'm not so sure whether staying home is a safe recommendation during this new moon eclipse. Well, joking aside, I have no idea what happened here.

Speaker 1: 2:34

So back to the episode. Right, I just had to share this with somebody and you were the first one I'm talking to, so that's what I'm sharing with you, first one I'm talking to, so that's what I'm sharing with you. So again, the tomorrow's new moon and eclipse is in Aries and that means it's the lunar beginning of the year. So it's kind of like a new year, different than the first of January new year. This is the lunar new year because Aries is the first sign in the zodiac, new moon, is always beginnings. So it's a double, triple, quadruple beginning, almost like, because we usually say that eclipses something ends and something new starts. And my mentor, my astrology mentor, silke Schaeffer, from Switzerland, says never was more beginning than now.

Speaker 1: 3:24

And so if you listen to last week's podcast episode about how to leverage Mercury retrograde for in your life and in your business, you know that I said it's not a good time to start new projects or sign contracts. And so you might think now, but Connie, now you're really contradicting yourself. Maybe one of these glass pieces hit you on the head or something. But I want to tell you no, I'm really contradicting yourself. Maybe one of these glass pieces hit you on the head or something, but I want to tell you no, I'm not contradicting myself. Yes, right now is Mercury retrograde and we shouldn't start new projects and we shouldn't sign important contracts and all the things that I last week talked about. But instead I also talked about last week what this time, these three weeks until April 25th, what they are good for. And now they're not three weeks anymore, it's only two weeks. It was three weeks last week. From now on, it's two more weeks. So in these two more weeks.

Speaker 1: 4:18

What we want to do is what I talked about last time, because Mercury retrograde asks us to go inside first, right, and so I'm suggesting that we're first cleaning up all the mental clutter we're having in our head, because to start new things, we actually want to let go of the baggage that we have still, and especially the mental baggage. I mean, it's good for clearing clutter in the physical realm and everything, like I talked about last time, it's really a good time to let go of all kinds of things. But if we want to be ready in the starting blocks for the time when Mercury turns around, so we want to clean up all the mental clutter and the sabotaging thoughts and the limiting thoughts and all the mental constructs we have of how we are, who we are, why we can't do things, why others are more qualified to do things, whatever weird thoughts you're having or is it just me that has all these weirdo things or not? Things, thoughts, right. So what I'm doing now this new moon in Aries, while Mercury's retrograde, while we're having eclipse, while bathroom sinks explode in Connie's bathroom what we want to do is we want to examine our mental clutter and ask ourselves what limiting beliefs or thoughts are holding us back from taking action on our goals, intentions and resolutions.

Speaker 1: 6:02

I mean, we don't only make goals and intentions on the 1st of January, right. But even if you did, now, it's three months later. What all did you start to implement? Or did you already reach maybe, some of your goals or milestones of your goals? And if not, what thoughts and limiting beliefs are holding you back from taking action? That's one of the questions you can ask yourself.

Speaker 1: 6:30

The other question is what thoughts and limiting beliefs are holding you back from letting go of the old that you really don't use anymore but that you still hang on to? I mean, you guys always think like I don't struggle with clutter, but I do. I do too. I mean, I'm very sentimental, so I'm hanging on to stuff and I have to be very aware of my limiting thoughts and the thoughts that are holding me back. So I'm challenging you Take the time. It doesn't have to be hours, it can just be while you're doing dishes, while you're brushing your teeth. Think a bit. What are the thoughts that are holding you back from letting go of old things, whether they're physical or whether they're digital, like old emails, whether they're physical or whether they're digital, like old emails, whether they're mental or emotional, even old grudges. You're having mental or limiting beliefs you're having. What is it that is holding you back? What thoughts are keeping you from actually really clearing the clutter out of your life, out of your business, out of your finances, to release it, to let it go, to just deposit the baggage on the side of the road and continue walking without it, kind of if that is a image that speaks to you, kind of if that is a image that speaks to you.

Speaker 1: 8:09

And while you're doing that, also, what are other reasons that you haven't taken action yet, but procrastinated? You had a goal for 2024. Did you go for it or did you not? Did you procrastinate? I for sure did procrastinate on certain things.

Speaker 1: 8:21

To ask myself that too or I'm actually in the process of asking myself, and what I came up with about procrastination is procrastination especially for me, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one often comes from wanting to have achieved the result already and, at the same time, beating myself up for where I am compared to where I want to be. So I want to be somewhere else. So I'm beating myself up for not being there, but at the same time, I'm procrastinating to go there because I'm beating myself up. You kind of see how this vicious circle is working in our life and how it's backwards we don't do anything because we want to have it done already, but then we beat ourselves up that we haven't done anything yet and we're not where we want to be. And because we're beating ourselves up, we really don't feel motivated to do anything and so we don't do anything, which leads again to being upset that we are not where we want to be. So it like procrastination is really, yeah, a tricky one. A tricky one especially if you're not paying attention.

Speaker 1: 9:44

You may fall into this trap, and what I want to say to that, and what I'm actually working on myself, is that we can't feel bad and beat ourselves up and beat ourselves into this idealized version of ourselves where we're taking action Right. We can't beat ourselves up and make ourselves feel bad and then expect that we're motivated to go forward. I don't think it works that way. It works much better if we're looking after ourselves and if we're kind to ourselves, if we are a loving parent to ourselves that insists that we do the things that we want to do, even if we don't feel like it in the moment, but we know that long term that is the right thing to do. But we do it in a loving way, like I said, a loving parent, right. And then also by understanding that we're never gonna arrive, we're never gonna be in a destination, even if we achieve a goal, we never will be in a destination where we don't want to go anywhere else anymore, where everything is just perfect. That doesn't exist.

Speaker 1: 10:58

I love how Matthew McConaughey says that we don't arrive but we improve, and so I think to beat procrastination, we have to stop thinking that we can arrive somewhere and we arrive there perfectly, because I do feel, too, that procrastination has a lot to do with perfectionism. So we can't arrive somewhere. The only thing we can do is improve, and we don't improve if we beat ourselves down for not doing certain things. I don't think we actually gonna really go out and do the things then, and even if we do for once or twice, it's not gonna last, it's not gonna be sustainable, because we all crave feeling good or feeling better, not to crave to feeling bad, and if we beat ourselves up, we do feel bad. So that is not going to work.

Speaker 1: 11:57

So one concept that I started to embrace quite a while ago already and we're actually that saying a few minutes a day keeps the chaos away comes from is that we need to learn to enjoy the process of improving ourselves, of improving our environment, of tweaking and bettering our lives and businesses. And whatever we try out day in and day out, and whatever we do, we need to be willing to do that habit for the rest of our lives for it to be sustainable and to maintain it as a result. Right, and what I mean by that is you can't beat yourself up and do something crazy and think that you can do this crazy thing for the rest of your life. That's not possible. It has to be small enough and enjoyable enough. As much as it can be enjoyable Change is always hard but as much as it can be enjoyable that you are willing to do this for the rest of your life. But even if you need to do it for the rest of your life, eventually it will become so easy and so part of you that you don't even notice that you're doing it. You need to come up with something small enough and you have to have the compassion for yourself but, at the same time, the willpower to do it, and that's how you're making progress towards your goals and that's kind of like how you're making progress towards your goals and that's kind of like what I came up with and that's how I reach my goals.

Speaker 1: 13:35

And then I forget again and I have to remind myself and have to make sure I don't beat myself up, because I was somebody who was actually really pushing myself and beating myself up a lot. It's really funny to have this saying now clearing clutter is self-love, because I was struggling a lot with finding even a little bit of compassion for myself. I always had compassion with everybody else, but not with myself. And maybe you feel the same way, or maybe you see somebody around you that is that way, that has compassion with everybody around them, but not with themselves. And it's so hard to see.

Speaker 1: 14:15

And a coach once said to me that I should look at myself as a little five-year-old girl and see whether I would really talk to her the way I talk to myself. And of course we wouldn't right Like we wouldn't. That's harsh, that's mean, we wouldn't do that. But we do it to ourselves. So I think this is what I want to let you go with. I want you to realize that you can't beat yourself up, you can't have all these negative thoughts about yourself and these limiting beliefs and everything and, at the same time, reach goals. That will really lead to procrastination At least that is my experience.

Speaker 1: 14:55

And to get out of this mental clutter, we need to learn to have compassion for ourselves and actually understand that there is no destination that we reach.

Speaker 1: 15:10

There is only improvement, every day a little bit better, and we're not comparing ourselves with anybody else, but maybe with ourselves how we were yesterday and could we improve a little bit today. Like Matthew McConaughey says, we don't arrive, we improve. So that's what I wanted to leave you with today. I hope you have a wonderful eclipse if you listen to this the day it comes out. So I wish you a wonderful week and talk to you next week. Bye, you can bring your chaos to me. Use the link in the show notes and sign up for a complimentary 30-minute chaos to peace jumpstart call where we will address your most pressing pain point around clutter and chaos and how to solve it in a few minutes a day and, if you're ready, we can also discuss options for moving forward together and how I can help you out on your journey from chaos to peace. You find the links to sign up in the show notes.