Clean Up Your Messes

This next article is part of an ongoing series here at TSB Magazine called The Success Principles. The series is based on the 64 principles laid out by Jack Canfield in his course of the same name. If youre new, I always suggest starting any series from the beginning.

Principle 28: Clean Up Your Messes and Your Incompletes

It is impossible for us to fully embrace the present if we have uncompleted projects or don’t have closure with certain people from our past.

As human beings we can only give a certain amount of things are select attention. If our to do list is filled with promises, agreements, and items… we won’t have room to bring new opportunities and abundance into our lives.

Many times people don’t like making difficult decisions or don’t like hurting someone’s feelings so they leave a lot of projects, tasks, and relationships without closure.. hoping that they go away on their own. Unfortunately things seldom go away on their own.

Canfield recommends getting into something he calls Completion Consciousness:

Continually ask yourself, What does it take to actually get this task completed? Then you can begin to consciously take that next step of filing completed documents, mailing in the forms required, or reporting back to your boss that the project has been completed. The truth is that 20 things completed have more power than 50 things uncompleted. Rather than starting 15 projects that end up incomplete and take up space in the house, you’d be better off if you had started just three and completed them.

If there is anything new that you want in your life, you’ve got to make room for it. I mean psychologically as well as physically.

I am always amazed when a friend tells me how much they want a girlfriend, someone that they really care about in their life. Yet, this same friend is continuing to date and sleep with an ex that he obviously doesn’t have a future with. How does he expect to find a girlfriend when most of his emotionally energy is tied into this past relationship?

A good exercise for today

Walk through your house and throw away anything that is no longer useful to you. Get rid of clothes you don’t wear, CDs you don’t listen to, and magazines you don’t read. Make room for new items to come into your life.

After that, make some closure with people from your past that still haunt your mind. Send an email to a girl you’ve been avoiding and tell her that you’re not interested in taking the relationship further. Call a family member and make up. Just clear your mind of these past distractions.