Wanna hear a National Clean up Day joke?
An elephant takes a refreshing bath in the river, then goes and rolls around in mud when it’s finished.
Okay, it’s not really a joke, but it is funny.
Funny mostly because that’s what most of us do in life.
National Clean up Day exists because we recognize the value of not turning our planet into a trash heap.
I’m not a hippie (you might be, no judgement), but I am smart enough to know that SOME environmental concerns are valid concerns.
I remember traveling the world, and coming back home when I was finished only to find my home town completely developed down to it’s shin bones.
Lush forest and eastern woodland environments completely taken over by car dealerships, gas stations and strip malls.
Look, I don’t HATE development, business or money, but I do dislike when we go overboard, especially with serious things like um…the only earth we have.
I sat in my car thinking “Where are the trees? I’m not a tree hugger, but no trees? That’s what we’ve decided on collectively? We want ZERO trees? Are we sure about that?”
(I often murmur allowed to myself at times. I find it to be extraordinarily useful)
If you know where this is from, leave it in the comments.
Anyway – National Clean up Day is more about responsibility and maturity in my book than anything else, but I’ve got one problem.
What’s the value of cleaning up our external environment, if our internal environment is still a shitty, dirty landfill.
If your insides came outside, would they look good or…ew?
All things are internal first, and the only reason were OK with being so immature with the garbage and waste issue on earth is because of the internal garbage we maintain in our lives.
Does it make sense to attack both? A war on two fronts?
I think so. Here are 7 Ways I’ve Come up with that will help you get rid of all the toxic B.S. in your life.
1. Get rid of Toxic People on National Clean up Day
Who are toxic people?
With the rise of cancel culture millennials took a big hit for coining the term toxic in general.
Unfortunately for those who shift the blame on us, the word existed long before we were born.
Ouch, that stings.
The word toxic means either poisonous or harmful and unpleasant in a pervasive insidious way.
Since humans generally are not eating other humans, the poisonous part does not apply. We’ll take the second definition.
Who are the types of people you should, like a confusing question on the S.A.T., simply omit?
Types of Toxic People to Throw in the Bin:
- Cynics: people who think it’s impossible for humans to do good selflessly. Everything is crap.
- Narcissists: those with an augmented fascination with themselves
- Manipulators: your just a pawn that pushes their agenda forward – a resource for them to use up and throw away
- Psychopaths: a neurological condition that causes people to always be callous, non emotional and without morals – Not all callous or emotionally vague humans are psychopaths though.
- Sociopaths: self interested “hot headed” people who act without others in mind
- Friends and family members who don’t support you (limit time, not necessarily delete)
- Chatty kathy’s: they just won’t shut up or mind their own business. Then they have the nerve to deny it when you bring it up.
- Hyper sensitive overly emotional people: Usually victims of some type of trauma or internal struggle that causes them to be sensitive about literally everything. Sometimes it’s actually your fault, sometimes they’re just not in control of their emotional experience.
- Victim Addicts: they might actually have been a victim in the truest sense at one point, but now they’ve given up their power over their own life and it’s everyone else’s fault.
- Super Judgemental People: Always eager to tell you what you should be doing with your life. Not the same as someone who is genuinely trying to help you.
- Non Critical Thinkers: These people don’t understand how to think life through and so every little experience or thought that pops into their head automatically becomes law. They make no sense at all.
- Red Pillers: Everything is the illuminati somehow.
- The Naive: Hippies. People who think life is just a kumbaya guitar circle and that we should all hold hands and love each other. They don’t understand that there truly are evil people. Their impractical addiction to “love and light” often leaves them disappointed and with negligible results.
- The Way To Cut Throat: They don’t know when to turn on the breaks. I’m on vacation dude, I’m not trying to fight you. Call me when i’m back in the states and we’ll see.
2. Your diet
When I was living in the Nicoya Peninsula, three things stood out the most about the lifestyle of the people there.
Nicoya is a bluezone, which means it has a high concentration of people who live to be 100 years old and beyond.
Their secret is simple.
How to live to be 100+ years old:
- No processed food
- Lots of exercise
- Less meat
Process food might as well be called laboratory food ya’ll – it’s gross and bad for you. You can eat whatever you want, but I know this, at the end of our lives, when all the pleasures of life have already been experienced, we’re concerned about just making it through another day.
I promise, when you hit that age, you’ll wish you had planned things out a little better.
Do you wanna be a spry, purposeful centenarian, or would you rather be in a nursing home, not remember your kids names and have a nurse wipe your ass until you croak?
Personally, I think it’s a pretty easy decision.
Vegetables are good mate. Cut out the processed food you’re just trolling yourself.
SECONDLY, these people live in very mountainous areas. We were literally in the jungle and it’s a struggle just to get to the pasture to rope in the cows.
Go to the gym, get walking, buy an exercise bike and get yourself some adjustable dumbbells. You’ll thank me for it later.
THIRD, I’m not telling you to stop eating meat. I’m not that guy. I do, HOWEVER, think that Americans and Westerners in general eat WAY too much meat.
When you eat that much meat, you’re probably filling up on it quickly and neglecting other stuff you need to be healthy. Like, uh, vitamins. You know what the word vitamin stands for?
VITAL MINERALS. AS IN, THEY’RE VITAL.
Follow these rules if you want to declutter your diet and be awesome. 🙂
3. Your conscious mind
What patterns habitually run in your mind? Do you imagine and play out scenarios the same way? Maybe you’re one of those people who defaults to not working out just to keep yourself safe.
Regardless, the mind is a much more comprehensive influence on our experience than physical reality, so you can change your mind about things and change the way you experience life.
Some good ways to regain control of your mind are:
- Subliminal programming (I’ve had success with these)
- Affirmations
- Meditation
- Mindfulness practice
- Breathing techniques
- Professional therapy
One of the best ways to change your conscious mind and the way it runs is to find a mentor, teacher or someone you trust that has mastered the type of mental state you are after. Then you can seek their counsel when you’re having an issue.
Exercise: every time you have a thought that makes you feel shitty, write it down and analyze it. What does it mean? Is it really true? Why is it there? How long has it been there? Is it accurate? Can you reshape it into something better?
You might forget, and that’s fine. Do it when you remember and it’ll become a habit after a while.
4. Your subconscious mind
As with anything in life, you have two camps (probably more actually): those who agree and those who disagree.
There’s a whole group of psychologists who think recent interest in the efficaciousness of the subconscious mind is inaccurate and…well, hooey.
Obviously they’re all more qualified than me, but I’ve played around with the normal ways of tampering with and manipulating unconscious and subconscious spaces and I’ve gotten good personal results from it.
PsychologyToday calls the subconscious mind our Pre-programmed Psyche Protective Apparatus, meaning that it’s a mechanism that allows our species to survive when traumatic, deadly, dangerous and violent situations arise that are difficult to deal with consciously.
Well there’s plenty of deadly, dangerous and violent situations in the average human life that we bury deep beneath the surface, and they might be subconsciously affecting your behavior.
If you really want to declutter, and not be a slave to programming from stiautions long passed, look into reprogramming or otherwise understanding the workings of your subconscious mind.
Read the book The Power of your Subconscious Mind
5. “The way things used to be” programming
My grandma, a darling ol’ gal, is always talking to me about how things used to be and her disappointment at how much things have changed.
Have you ever heard someone say “they don’t make me like they used to”?
It’s half true, half unwise.
True because it’s a basic law of the universe that all things decay. It’s called entropy.
It’s unwise because there’s no reason to let that cause you distress, especially since there’s literally nothing you can do about it.
Sure we can all maintain our homes to keep them from falling over, and we can maintain our health nicely to ensure we live long healthy lives, but ultimately, entropy takes us all.
Examine your long held belief systems and determine whether they’re still valid today. You may be able to free yourself from something outdated.
6. Who you were five years ago
Who were you five years ago? Is that version of you holding you back?
I really don’t have much to say in this section admittedly, other than you can choose to be whoever you want to be every given moment.
As soon as you decide you want it, you can have it. The only thing that needs to be followed is a strategic action plan and some self belief.
7. The Sickening Disguised Bad Habit
I’m not going to lecture you about: checking your emails as soon as you wake up, eating too close to bedtime or any of that crap.
Those things are certainly valid, but when i say disguised habits I mean the more insidious things hidden just beneath your consciousness that you do because of habits you formed back during who knows when.
Disguised Bad Habits like:
- Ruminating over things too much
- Complicating circumstances with your imagination and no evidence
- Programming yourself to expect the worst
- Relying on others or approval disguised as self deprecating comments
- Sabotaging yourself by saying you never wanted a thing in the first place, knowing that you really just lack the confidence to go after it
These are almost worse than the bad habits we know we have, because we’ve disguised them in costumes that don’t look nearly as sinister.
Sit down with a notebook and really get to the bottom of things that you do. If you have a hard time isolating them, take a gander at this post on toxic mental habits.
