Cleaning House and Moving On

I have had to “clean house” in my life on many different occasions, for many different reasons, and in many different ways. Reflecting back on the experiences I have had with cleaning house, the behavioral house cleanings are the ones that stick out the most in my mind and have had the biggest, most profound impacts on my life.

The most recent example of this happened just over the summer. For as long as I could remember, I found myself engaging in a counterproductive and destructive behavior in nearly every relationship I had. I had become a master at responding to others – even those I called my “closest friends” – in a way that I thought they wanted me to respond, not in the honest way that I, as my own person, naturally wanted to. I felt so drained and miserable and I realized this was because all of the years of me trying desperately to stifle who I was, what I wanted, and what I thought, were finally catching up with me.

As I thought more about it and observed myself closer, I realized that this self-suppression was something I had been doing for so long that it had become virtually automatic! I was devastated at this realization that nobody truly knew me. Of course this was a painful and intense reality to face, but at the same time, it was surprisingly liberating that I was finally able to see my situation for what it was.

There was a sudden clarity about everything that had never existed before. Upon that realization was when I decided to take immediate steps to clean house of this people-pleasing, self-stifling behavior. To the best of my ability, I started doing things like relaxing and being myself around friends. I stopped comparing myself to others. I started saying what I felt and thought, instead of sugarcoating, watering down, or completely denying it altogether. I stopped being afraid that others would not want to be around me if I showed them my true self and I decided that if the friends I had were worth the investment, they would accept me for who I was and those that weren’t would be simply filtered out.

By making this cleaning-house decision a top priority to live out in my everyday life, I was sent on a natural high for days. I felt a freedom I had never before experienced. Essentially, by cleaning house of this particular behavior, I was putting into action what I had known to be true for years but was unable to actually live out in my life until that point.

The natural process of maturation and learning brought me to a place where I could be brave enough to start living the way that I both wanted and needed to. This cleaning house experience was directly related to the self determination theory – I needed to feel free to choose my own path in my relationships instead of being coerced or pressured into certain behaviors (Campbell Eichorn 244). Like I said, this was a behavior I had engaged in for years, so it has been a process trying to break free from it. Every day I still have to consciously make an effort to live out the decision that I made to clean house of self-suppression. I know that I still have a long way to go, but I also know that I am on the right track.

Another example that came straight to my mind was a less recent, but very important cleaning house decision that I made about a year and a half ago. Starting the summer before entering my senior year of high school, I had been continuously losing weight. I put myself on a restrictive, harsh diet and although my original intent was to lose only the few pounds that I had gained my junior year, I would up losing way more than I had intended and than what was healthy. It got to a point where I could no longer deny that what I was doing was detrimental to my health and needed to stop.

It had become all about control. I was at a time in my life where I felt uncertain and scared and I wanted to feel completely in control of at least one thing. Food and body image became that one thing that I felt was within my ability to control, so that was where I focused most of my energy. I was definitely caught in a strange loop as I obsessed over this one aspect of my life as a way to avoid dealing with everything else that I felt was out of my control. It was difficult for me to get to the place where I could fully acknowledge this and even more difficult for me to change my mind set in order to change the behavior.

My decision to clean house meant I completely stopped counting calories and allowed myself to slowly, but surely gain weight back until I was at a healthy weight again. I had to constantly make a conscious effort to let go of my need to be so rigid with myself and my fear of gaining weight. Cleaning house from this behavior has been a long process because of all the causal, under the surface issues that I had to (and continue to) work through and deal with. The hardest part of all was facing these problems I had been avoiding.

As difficult as it was, as I slowly began to live out my decision to clean house of this behavior, I became much happier and, of course, healthier. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could trust myself way more than I thought I could and that I liked how I looked at a healthy weight. Similar to my first example, I was elated with the freedom I felt by cleaning house from this behavior.

In both of these cleaning house experiences, self-forgiveness played a big part in me moving forward with my life. Especially since, technically, I was the only one to blame for the messes I had gotten myself into. I had to deal with feelings of anger and disgust towards myself. “Once you grant yourself forgiveness you can focus on how to become a better person and make healthier choices in the future,” (Campbell Eichorn 254). That was absolutely true for me – the house was could not be truly clean until I forgave myself.

"Every time I tried to be what they wanted from me

It never came naturally, so I ended up in misery

Was unable to see all the good around me

Wasted so much energy on what they thought of me

Than simply just remembering to breathe

I'm humanly unable to please everyone at the same time

So now I find my peace of mind living one day at a time"
-- Christina Aguilera