E225: 11 Ways to Spring Clean Your Life in 2023

Spring is in the air and we are doing a whole lot more than cleaning! It’s the perfect time to refresh and renew your life. Let’s start this spring season with a life cleanse!

[00:43] HELLO SPRING!

Happy Spring Equinox (for the listeners in the Northern Hemisphere, and Fall Equinox if you’re listening from the Southern Hemisphere). You may already know that I am an astrology enthusiast, and while a lot of the world may celebrate the new year on January 1st, in the astrological calendar the start of Aries Season is actually the beginning of the year!

Regardless of what you consider to be the new year, I think we can all agree that spring is a time of revival, rebirth, and teeming with possibilities!

This year, the spring equinox happens on March 20th at exactly 5:24pm EST. The word equinox literally translated means “equal night.” Because of the position of the sun above the equator, the day and night are very equal in length in both the northern and southern hemispheres!

What I recently learned was that this exact moment of the sun crossing over the Earth’s equator is known as the “vernal equinox” from the Latin word vernare, which means “to bloom” [source] isn’t that so pretty!

Many cultures all over the world celebrate this time of year with festivals, intentions, rituals, cleansing, fasting, and so much more! A lot of these celebrations are rooted in the time of year that brings new crops to communities.

We can use this fresh spring energy to cleanse our entire life this season!

[02:16] Let’s start with: Resetting Our Goals

Look back on the goals you set earlier this year. When you reflect on them, which ones do you still feel excited about? If there are goals you have already achieved, how are you celebrating them? What about the goals that you’re still working towards? How can you get back on track with them?

It’s a great practice to re-evaluate our goals throughout the year, and make any necessary changes or adjustments.

I also want to mention that this is meant to be done without judgment. Re-evaluate goals objectively. I understand that we set meaningful goals for ourselves, but we don’t want to get too emotionally attached to the outcomes. Instead, observe the facts and logistics of your goals, and use the data and your intuition to decide whether it’s worth going for, or if it’s not for right now.

AND this is NOT permission to give up on your dreams! I will tell you right now that I had a goal of being on more podcasts this year, as a guest and when I looked at my goal at the beginning of this month I was slacking. But instead of getting discouraged, I challenged myself to change things up and I can share with you today that I have completed three podcast interviews since sharing that goal with you in episode 222!

With your new goals you can be more intentional with your actions moving forward. This can include making space for the goals you want to manifest.

[04:16] One of the best ways to make space for your goals is to literally make space and Declutter Your Home.

I know there are some of you out there who LOVE SPRING CLEANING! And I’ve got to say, I love when the cleaning is done, but I don’t always love doing it. However once in a while I do get inspired to deep clean my home.

So if you’re like me, you may also like this little calendar I’ve prepared called “Seven Days of Decluttering.”

Day One: Clean Out Your Closet: Donate or sell anything that no longer sparks joy

Day Two: Reorganize Your Pantry: Toss anything that is expired, and refresh with matching/cute storage containers for easy access so you actually use your pantry items

Day Three: Choose One Room in Your Home to Deep Clean

Day Four: Finally Organize Your Junk Drawer

Day Five: Declutter Your WFH Workspace: Bring in new energy and creativity with a tidy office space

Day Six: Clean Out Your Skincare: Toss any expired products or make up and replace with non-toxic alternatives

Day Seven: Purchase Air-Purifying Plants to Liven Up Your Space

Breaking different rooms, areas of the home, or tasks down into separate days makes the projects more manageable and helps build momentum on the bigger picture. Plus cleaning can be quite exhausting for a lot of us hahaha

[06:45] Since we’re making time to declutter our space, we can continue the momentum with Spring Cleaning Our Finances.

This is a great time to re-evaluate and eliminate any expenses that aren’t bringing us joy. With those out of the way, what expenses can we get excited about and budget for?

One year I noticed I was spending A LOT of money on coffee dates with friends and decided that I wanted to swap those to “walking dates.” The outcome was epic because

1) I was saving money

2) I was drinking less caffeine

3) I was moving my body more

4) I was getting fresh air

5) I was inspiring my friends to have more walking dates too!

6) I was exploring new places

No brainer, right?

It’s also a great time to review recurring charges on our credit card and bank statements. Which ones are we actually using on a regular basis, and which ones can we cancel?

We recently canceled Netflix and truthfully I don’t miss it. It’s also helping me because I’m spending more time reading than watching random shows.

[07:55] Along with our goals and creating space for our manifestations, another great way to spring clean your life is to Adopt Healthy Habits.

It’s about time we start incorporating and prioritizing the habits and routines we keep saying we’re going to start!

Share in the comments of this video, or on instagram: which healthy habits are you prioritizing this season?

Here are some popular habits and tips for each of them!

Movement + Exercise

As an educator in the fitness space I cannot stress this enough: FIND AN EXERCISE THAT YOU ENJOY AND LOOK FORWARD TO! Why on earth would you commit to something you don’t love or are excited about? Pass.

Healthy Eating

Keep your nutrition simple by purchasing whole foods and packaged goods with four ingredients or less. You’ll be amazed at how much garbage ingredients are in a box of store-bought cookies.

Another simple clean eating tip is to “shop the outside of the grocery store” this is usually where whole foods can be found, versus the packaged products in the aisles.

Meditation

There are a lot of ways to meditate and so many meditation styles. Something that really helped me with my consistency in meditation was changing my intention of quieting or calming my thoughts, and instead I observe my thoughts. This allowed me to cultivate more mindfulness and awareness and now my meditation practice goes beyond sitting on a pillow in silence every morning.

Sleep Hygiene

Stick to a consistent schedule of going to bed and waking up at the same time every day – or within the same 90 minutes every day. For example You wake up between 6:30 and 8:00 am daily and go to bed between 9:00 and 10:30 pm nightly.

[10:19 ] A wonderful habit to create is a Gratitude Practice. This can be part of your meditation practice, or journaling, or any of the many other ways you can practice gratitude!

Taking time each day to express gratitude for the things you have and the people in your life is not only an amazing habit, but a wonderful way to attract MORE of what you’re grateful for!

It can truly help cultivate a positive mindset and increase happiness, along with manifesting more gratitude and abundance into your life.

I’ve done a few episodes on gratitude in the past, one was a story of a past client, and the other was from my experience of practicing gratitude every day for a year, and what it taught me.

Past episodes on gratitude:

E165: Exponential Growth through Gratitude

E69: What 365 Days of Gratitude Taught Me

If you feel that it’s challenging to think of what you are grateful for, I suggest starting really small with tiny moments of gratitude.

You can also start the journal practice with letting go of whatever you’re holding onto in your mind and just get it out onto paper. This is a meditation or healing practice on its own. Once it’s on the paper, you can release it – heck! Burn the paper if you want to! (Safely)

[11:40] In addition to practicing gratitude, another excellent way to Spring Clean your life is to notice where and WHO you’re spending your time with.

Connecting with Loved Ones is a wonderful way to strengthen relationships and bring a sense of happiness and fulfillment into our lives. This can be done through a phone call, video chat, in person, or I sometimes do walking dates with friends. We both go for a walk in our respective areas and walk and talk on the phone.

Notice which people you keep in contact with the most, and perhaps which relationships you need to overhaul. Commit to and nurture the relationships that make you feel good and happy to be around.

Maybe during this audit you think of people you want to forgive. How can you release the stress, anger, resentment, or pain that you’re holding onto from these strained relationships? Maybe the person you need to forgive is yourself?

[12:25] It doesn’t just have to be the relationships you cleanse in your life, but also some of the activities as well as your time.

Reassess Your Schedule, where is there time wasted that you can replace with activities that make you happier or better?

I find myself mindlessly scrolling on social media sometimes, this is a great time to detox your social media. You can do this by unfollowing any accounts that do not inspire you or align with your vibe. That way if you do get caught in a mindless scroll, at least you’re connecting with accounts that make you happy.

Something that is helping me is having tech-free spaces in my home. Disclaimer: this is a work-in-progress! But I’m really keeping tech out of the bedroom and also the dinner table. I find this to be more difficult when I’m eating alone, and also my partner has his phone in bed with him, but I try to read instead. Definitely notice FOMO when he’s giggling at TikToks though.

[14:!5] Spring has such an incredible energy of NEW-NESS and so it makes it an excellent time to Learn Something New!

What hobby or skill interests you? I’ve been enjoying learning French on Duolingo, and I have a ton of cute recipe books that I could definitely dive into and try some new recipes out.

Maybe there’s a hobby that you’ve always wanted to try? Or a class/workshop you want to take? Make this new season an excuse to try or learn something new!

[14:43] Of course one of my favourite things to do this season is Get Outside. It’s so easy to get stuck indoors during the winter months. I am bad at this, but learning to be better. We went on a few snowboard/ski trips this year that have been really fun!

If you need a little nudge, here are some benefits of spending time outside:

[source]

We move more when we’re outdoors
Being in nature for 30 minutes can lower blood pressure and pulse
We have access to fresh air
We tend to seek more social connection when we’re in nature which also boost our general mental health and wellness
Speaking of, spending time in nature is a mood booster
Has immune boosting benefits as well – especially if we’re breathing in the magic of nature’s aromatherapy
And of course decreasing our stress and anxiety

Seven super awesome reasons to get your booty outside… ASAP!

Spending time in nature is so amazing for our health and wellness. Whether it's going for a walk, hiking, or simply sitting outside and enjoying the fresh air. Being in nature can improve your mood, reduce stress, and increase feelings of well-being.

[16:31] Spring cleans your life by Detoxing Your Habits. Which habits are no longer serving you, and what new behaviours do you want to replace them with?

These could be the habits we were talking about earlier in this episode. One of the best ways to break a bad habit is to replace it with a new and better one.

[16:45] Spring cleaning our lives doesn’t have to be a one and done practice – and often it isn’t! We want to put systems in place that support us throughout the year so we don’t just clean once and everything is right.

With our new cleaned up home, and office, we can now Organize Our Environment. Create a system for organizing belongings, such as by using storage containers, labeling items, and creating designated spaces for different items.

Having designated spaces for things decreases mess, makes it easier to find what you’re looking for, and in turn can make you more productive.

[17:33] The Spring Season is a beautiful time of change and transition. Of course these changes do NOT have to happen overnight. Take your time easing into the season by choosing one or two of these ideas to start with.

Maybe you felt inspired and came up with some of your own ways to celebrate and cleanse your life – share them with me in the comments below this video, or on Instagram @vallavignelife! I would LOVE to hear about what you’re implementing this season.

Podcast Host

Valerie LaVigne

Valerie is the creator and founder of Valerie LaVigne Life and the Women's Empowerment Show. She helps busy and empowered women create healthy habits so that they can become the best version of themselves and transform their lives. Learn more about Valerie here!