Awakened Conscious Conversations
Healing the world one episode at a time by offering realistic solutions to the journey of life. Both self hosted ( By The Gentle Yoga Warrior) and guest episodes.
Many of our guests have overcome significant obstacles and transformed their lives.
Rich with deep talks and solo endeavours, often offering tips on living a more conscious life.
Many episodes include a bonus optional meditation!
Awakened Conscious Conversations
The Spiritual Art of Letting Go: How Minimalism Creates Flow in Your Home and Life
What if the clutter in your home is actually blocking the flow of energy in your life? Welcome back to the podcast after a brief hiatus due to illness, as I share my personal philosophy on creating a more peaceful living environment through mindful decluttering.
Contrary to being just about tidying up, this episode reveals how letting go of physical possessions we no longer need creates space for positive energy, clarity, and spiritual wellbeing. Drawing from both practical experience and spiritual understanding, I guide you through a compassionate approach to decluttering that acknowledges the emotional attachments we form with our possessions while offering practical solutions for moving forward.
You'll discover manageable strategies for tackling different areas of your home—from the wardrobe (the easiest starting point) to kitchen cupboards, children's toys, and even digital files. Learn why organizing clothes by color creates visual harmony, how proper food storage prevents waste, and why your bedroom should remain a sanctuary rather than a laundry processing center. I also address the environmental aspects of decluttering, suggesting thoughtful ways to donate, recycle, or repurpose items rather than contributing to landfill.
The episode culminates in a loving-kindness meditation designed to complement your decluttering journey. This practice helps expand your capacity to give and receive love—mirroring the expansive energy that naturally flows through a decluttered home. Whether you're feeling overwhelmed by possessions or simply seeking to create more intentional living spaces, this episode offers both the practical guidance and spiritual encouragement to transform your home into what I call "a warm hug"—a place of true peace and sanctuary in an often chaotic world. Take the first small step today; your future self will thank you.
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A note for every episode: we do not necessary agree with all the views on our podcast and leave listeners to make their own mind up with what they do or don't agree with.
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Hello everybody. I'm your host, the Gentle York Warrior, and I'm delighted to be back behind the podcast mic. Apologies, there wasn't a show for the last few weeks. The other week I had this awful virus and it kind of affected my throat. It came out of nowhere. No one I knew got it, so I think my body just needed a massive rest. But unfortunately it affected the throat so I had to have a bit of time off from doing the podcasting. And also there's people's time is really precious. So and all the podcasts for that week I just cancelled until I was fully better, because I didn't want to mess people about, because I appreciate it's a lot to go on someone else's podcast.
Speaker 1:I've been a guest on a podcast before. It takes a lot of guts and gumption to put oneself out there. So I just want to say a big shout out, thank you for the guests that were meant to have on. You'll be guests again on the show and thank you for your understanding. But I want to send a very special shout out to Natalie. I just want to say thank you, natalie, from the bottom of my heart for sponsoring the show. It makes a big, massive difference for me to be able to help me produce the show, and so I just want to say a heartfelt thanks and if there's anything specific you would like me to share on the show, do let me know. And, dear listeners, if you're interested at all in sponsoring the show, if you look at the show notes or you go to my website, shamanichealingsorg, you will find a way to sponsor the show there.
Speaker 1:When I was ill, I was watching programs which I don't know what really amassed. To be honest, I don't even have a tv, because it's one of my favorite things is to kind of get rid of stuff. I'm probably the opposite of. To be honest, I don't even have a TV Because it's one of my favourite things is to kind of get rid of stuff. I'm probably the opposite of a hoarder. I wouldn't say I was completely minimalist. I do like some things, but I'm not one for keeping on to things sentimentally Though I do have some sentimental things and as I was watching these shows on house improvements and decluttering and stuff and how I've kind of gone through my own decluttering process over the years, where I realized that sometimes things that I had I didn't actually want anymore because they didn't have particularly good memories and I felt okay to let them go, but I realized how difficult it was for people to let go of things because they see the memories and things and generally the premise of these various shows.
Speaker 1:They kind of let people keep their memories but kind of condensed the need to have all these things. And, unfortunately, having to help with clearing stuff for living and departed relatives is quite a big process and it and I feel that I would do it again and again to help these people. But I feel that when I pass, I want to make the process as easy as possible. Don't worry, I don't plan to go for a while, but I just felt that it was really important to share a show on how kind of less can be more in our life. Yeah, so this process, this cathartic process of keeping just the stuff that we really need and letting go of the stuff that we don't need and there's been many people that have made a living out of it, and Marie Kondo is a person I read several years ago and even had someone come in. Marie Kondo, the house really helped me how to sort and tidy things and though I'm not the most tidy person, I'm not the most messy person either and at the very least I have, like my, my kitchen nice and tidy and my drawers nice, and I think I'm probably a rare thing in the sense that I have a lot less stuff than most people that I know, and I tend to wear most of my wardrobe if I don't love it, if I'm not likely to wear it again for a special occasion, and if it doesn't fit, then I tend to donate it to charity. So there can be a number of reasons let's cut that again why people can't hoard things. It gives them a sense of security.
Speaker 1:I've seen it quite often when people have kind of come from not much, they don't want to let go of stuff and it feels like it's wrong. Or you can go the other way when you've come from not much and you don't feel like you should hold on to anything because you don't deserve it, sometimes it just ends up getting bigger and bigger and bigger, until the fact that you, your food covers are so overflowing that you can't see that the food has gone out of date. And again, this is without no judgment at all. We're all so busy these days these things can kind of easily happen. But what I want to share you to do is that by cleaning or getting rid of stuff that we don't need or reducing the amount of stuff in the house that we have, we can see and enjoy the things that we do like to use and we can have, like a cherished, cherished photos file which you keep in a nice box. Or maybe you've got your cherished wedding dress, which you keep in the box, but maybe the 10 cocktail dresses that you might have loved when, when you're 18 and you haven't worn for 20 plus years, is time to either sell them.
Speaker 1:Or there's a lot of places that that will buy secondhand clothes or donate them to a charity shop. Definitely don't put them in landfill, but donate them to a charity shop. Or, yeah, there's all things like that. But be wary of kind of passing all your stuff on to someone else, because sometimes people don't want the responsibility so they'll give it to someone else. I would say by all means try it, because sometimes relatives, family members, friends might want our stuff, but I think the best way to handle that is to say to them I will not be offended if you don't want it. In that way, then they don't feel like obliged to take the stuff on, because then it just ends up filling up their cupboards, or if you're struggling to clear that the house one of the tips that I was listening to was like is to just say that you're doing your kitchen is to find a space. Maybe you do it on a sunny day or something. Lay stuff on your lawn and then just see count how many things of each thing that you've got. And if you've got a million cups, then maybe take some of them to the charity shop and it's not doing anything wrong. By letting go of this stuff it's creating space so that you can fully let the house flow, the energy flow, and then things flow into your life.
Speaker 1:I'm going to do a process now of going through my computer, which is probably going to take a bit of time, but just to kind of let go of any files there that I don't need anymore or that are just taking up space. You know how we can kind of hold on to things there as well, which can. I wish in hindsight that I had filed things in a better system. Sure there's. I'm going to look into the best way to do that. But from the spiritual aspect, when we kind of have things in order, it helps our life to flow in a more fluid and beautiful manner.
Speaker 1:But there's times, you know, when there's illness, all kinds of reasons that can stop our houses being in the way we want to be. And also, you know, sometimes we can put this pressure on to have a show house or we think people will judge us by the way our house is. But I would say the people that care about us and love us the most will accept us how we are. But if one's house is sort of a flow and that people can't get around to visit, then that is kind of putting a barrier up towards the loved ones that you may want to come around and see you. So I think one of my biggest tips is not to try and take on the whole house at once. It'd be too overwhelming.
Speaker 1:The easiest place, I feel, is to start with one's wardrobe and just be completely honest. Like if you've got 10 red jumpers, you're not likely to wear all of them unless you wear red all the time. Can you donate them? I like to kind of store my clothes so they're all the same colors together. I've done this for years and years and then I know it became the trend. I saw online that people do that, but I've kind of always found that the best way to to see what I've got is I put like all the same colors together. Uh, I even put at one point I used to when I used to be into shoes I even used to put the same like the shoes next to the the folder clothes, like in the wardrobe. So then I'd knew, know which was which, but that was just something that I used to do. Yeah, I would say like clothes are usually the thing that takes the most amount of space.
Speaker 1:I have heard that old toys so the kids have grown up and that teddy bear that they had as a baby, maybe keep that, but then the other 20 teddies plus that they don't use anymore, then donate them to charities. They will gratefully take on those things. I have also seen charity boxes at recycle centers where you can put your cuddly toys into and then they take them to a charity. So there's all ways to do it. One thing if you've given something to a charity shop, but obviously don't give something that's like stained and awful, I would say, speak to your local recycle center and they will tell you how to process that in the most efficient way. I know a lot of recycle centers in the UK at least. I can't speak for other countries. They will do energy from waste. So there is things that that can't go to charity shops, won't fit into um selling or or things like that, and they they can advise you but they'll make energy out of that waste. So there is ways to kind of be kind of green with it all.
Speaker 1:But the energy that you feel, or that I feel, when there's space doesn't have stuff in that is not used, it feels so calming and a sense of flow and I can see what I need to to get. So if I want a specific book, I can see it straight on the bookshelf that I tend to give my books on. I like reading, so I tend to give my books on. I also share it with a book club where a book swap club, where I'll put books into that and then I'll just keep some books that I know that I will look at again. I used to have like bookshelves full, like a lot of them. I didn't bother reading again, I just thought, well, someone else could be enjoying that book rather than sitting on the shelf. I do have a couple of sentimental ones which I only look at every now and again, but I try to keep it minimus. And then another place where it can have a lot of stuff that people don't need is the kitchen cupboards, and it again I like to.
Speaker 1:I go through my food every now and again and I just check that there's nothing coming up to the out of date thing. I like to put them near the front so then I can use them up before they go out of date. So, touch wood, I tend to have very, very few and far, far between. I'd say like 99.9% of the food that I have I tend to eat within date. That's just a figure that I've worked out in my head, so it's not an exact science, but I tend to use everything up because I put the stuff at the front that's going to go out of date and then I'll devise meals from that. Again, I know there's a lot of guilt about throwing food away and of course we should try not to waste food. But if things are past the use before date so the use before date then you can't eat them. Again, it's better to get rid of that stuff and then concentrate on keeping it covered so that you can use the stuff that is usable If there's food that's in date, that's in date and that you don't want.
Speaker 1:There are. So there's so many food banks popping up in the UK, I think, because people can't afford to live anymore. There's been so many popping up and people that are working because the cost of living is so high these days that people are using them, and I feel there's no shame at all if. If you need to use one of the food banks, I know that they are always looking for food. So if the food is in date and the packaging has not been opened, then look in your local thing and do contact them and take the food to them.
Speaker 1:If it is out of date, unfortunately you'll have to expose a bit, if at all possible, if it's too much. You think, oh gosh, there's so much, it's too much to do. Why don't you just do like a jar or can a day, and then that way it doesn't feel so overwhelming? So we are all so busy, we all have so much pressure on ourselves, but trust me, when you've got less stuff in your house, you're going to feel so much more better about yourself. Life is going to flow a lot better, and just think about the people you're helping that.
Speaker 1:There was some. We were doing some car boot sales but to be honest, it was taking a lot of our energy up because it was quite an early start drive and taking the stuff and selling it and we were finding we weren't getting that much for it at all, which is which is fine. But then we thought actually we'd rather give it to charity, because they weren't particularly like high value items. Or just to say, if you do have high value items, there's a lot of auction houses, okay, they will take a cut but they will sell the stuff for you, which is really good. So if you do think you've got some high value items that that you want to sell, then do reach out to auction houses. But we in the end ended up putting the things on our step and just saying free and take, and I think everyone took everything apart from one item which we thought actually we're going to keep this one item because we thought, yeah, it's actually a nice thing and we decided to give something else away instead.
Speaker 1:So then we had the space and then like garages oh my gosh, garages can be such a dumping ground. But the thing is right, there's no point having a million things in your garage and you can't see what you've got. So if you want to keep some off cuts of wood in case you're going to use something, just have a few of the off cuts of wood again. You can take the rest of some off cuts of wood in case you're going to use something, just have a few of the off cuts of wood again. You can take the rest of the off cuts of wood to the recycling center if you feel that you, we put drawers in ours, so then we can see what we've got on each thing. So if you've got a gardening section, you'll put the garden section in together. The tool section. I do a little bit of DIY, but not to. I don't have the skill set nor the inclination to kind of learn to the same standard as my partner. But tools, do you need like 20 screwdrivers that are the same size? Again, there's a lot of charities that would be very grateful to have these tools. There's some charity, there's lots of charities out there.
Speaker 1:Do just go online and find what's in your local area and then in the lounge, you want that place, the living room, to be a place of calmness. So if you've got, if you've got kids and you've got loads of toys. Minimize the amount of mess by having storage and and and putting the same types of toys together, and then that kind of inspires the children to put them back in the same place. And then the bedroom should definitely be a place of sanctuary. So if your bedroom is overflowing with laundry, you really don't want to have your bedroom as the laundry processing place. Try and find a different area. Maybe you can kind of jiggle your kitchen around a bit so that there's a place to process the laundry and have specific baskets with people's names on, so that your kids can have a basket that you put the clean laundry into and then they process it into their room, rather than you having a mountain of clothing. So these, these are quite practical things I'm giving you because I just wanted to kind of help you on the practical side.
Speaker 1:But what does a clean, tidy, flowing house mean to me? It makes the place more kind of, more like a sanctuary, a place of peacefulness. You're more likely to meditate, you're more likely to do things that are going to help you with your daily life, you're more likely to sit and read if you're sitting in a nice calm space and you're more likely to have fun and family time together if the lounge isn't overflown with mess. And if you need someone to help with this, I believe there are some charities that will come and help as well. So if you're feeling like you can't do it on yourself, can you ask a good friend to maybe like help you for like half an hour once a week or those kind of things. So there is ways around it. But the spiritual side feels the most important thing. It just makes it makes the house feel like a warm hug.
Speaker 1:When it's in a disarray. I get very affected by, like, lots of mess and, like I said, I'm not a neat, overly neat person, but I least like the place to be clean, surfaces to be cleaned and just the stuff that I need about. I know sometimes people say that they have organised chaos and know where things are, and I'm no doubt there are some people that can live that way. And I know when I get in a really creative mode sometimes I can get a bit messy, but then I'll always kind of go back and tidy it all up. It's really interesting how everyone's different actually, and it's what makes it more interesting. But, dear listeners, what ways can you tidy up your life and what ways will it make you feel better? Yeah, I'd be really interested to know. So, as always, here is a meditation inspired by life, and I thought I'd do reshare the loving kindness meditation, because I think we need to be kinder to ourselves, we need to be kinder to each other and, in a world that is so strange these days, the more that we can send love and kindness to each other, the better it is for us all.
Speaker 1:Top tips for the meditation is either sit nice and cross-legged on the floor with a nice straight back always nice to sit on a block or a cushion, although that's not available for you. You sit in a chair with the back nice and straight. The important thing is you're not slouching and if you're doing something that requires your concentration, all you need to do is just pause this and you can reconvene the meditation at a time that is good for you. If you're doing the meditation, let's begin tail with an elongated ease, a rhythm. If you need to fidget, just keep coming back to the breathing. Try and resist the temptation to fidget. Just keep coming back to the breathing. Try and resist the temptation to fidget.
Speaker 1:Slow equals a calmer state of mind, from your energetic heart centre, the space in front of the heart. Imagine a big, bright, beaming light of love emanating from your heart centre, a green, vibrant, uplifting, so large and bright that it has the ability to fill the room. That it has the ability to fill the room as you beam your love out into the world. Imagine love beaming down to you from the universal heart in return. So the more love you give out, the more love you receive back. Keep going with it Deep, slow breathing, allowing yourself to fill up with light, allowing the love to expand and grow, grow, grow, grow.
Speaker 1:Let it go Big and bright. Give up the fight. Allow this illuminating, beautiful power of love as it comes down to you unconditionally from above, as you share and you care and you find your natural flair. And you care and you find your natural flair, you heal and reveal the heart of your soul. It's not always about overcoming goals, but being present, being in love, being like so peaceful, like a dove floating, flying above.
Speaker 1:Keep going with it, slow, deep breathing, and allowing yourself to fill it with light. Don't fidget, don't give a fight. Allow the love to expand and grow. Step into your inner, god, goddess, and let yourself glow. Send that love to the first person you could imagine next to you and just imagine in turn then passing the love to the next person and the next, until the love just builds, and builds and builds and it eradicates all evil, allows it to go back to the light and transform into love Without judgment.
Speaker 1:You allow the world to heal with lashings of love from above. So each person, each person passes love on to the next. All done with kindness, no one is vexed. The love just grows and grows. The light is omniscient, all healing, all knowing as it grows and grows and grows. And in a moment you find some inspiration, a single thought from up above.
Speaker 1:How can you help others expand and find ways for deeper love? Allow the silence for the message to come. Give up the fight of thinking you have to be perfect. Know that you are always love and always worth it. So as you start to breathe more presently into the room, come back to the moment, come back to the now. Allow yourself to flower like nature on a spring day and don't let boundaries stop love coming your way. So inhale and exhale. Inhale and exhale back into the room. Do this meditation daily, or once or twice a day and it will allow you to feel more love and, in turn, give more love out to the world in an expanded way to help others. I believe love can heal the world and this meditation is the perfect antidote to hate, and perhaps over the next week you may come up with some more ideas on how you can help others in an expanded way. Remember, it doesn't have to be flash. Even the smallest gesture can lift up someone's day.
