When it comes to abundance - feeling it, having it, experiencing it - I’ve found there are two surprising prerequisites involved: letting go and saying, “No.” Now, that might sound crazy, at first, but bear with me and I’ll show you why.

Creating abundance in your life is as much about removing what you don’t want from your life as it is about attracting what you do want. Removing what you don’t want is pretty hard to do while you’re hanging on to it or continuing to say ‘yes’ to more of it. Attracting more of what you do want is equally difficult when you don’t have the space for it. So the first thing you must do to be more abundant, and yes it sounds a bit backward, is let go and say ‘no’ more often. Create the space for what you do want.

For example, a closet full of clothes that don’t fit, that you don’t like, that you never wear might make you abundant in the technical sense of the word, but are you feeling it? Probably not. Lost amongst all those clothes are the ones that do fit, yet you have trouble putting your hands on those most of the time because all the ones that don’t fit are in the way. That’s how you can look at a closet stuffed full of clothes and feel lack. Talk about crazy! Even if you had the money to buy new clothes, where would you put them?

But if you decide to go through that closet and weed out all the clothes that don’t fit, that you don’t like, that you never wear and let go of them (donate them, sell them on eBay, give them away), you’ll have all kinds of room for new clothes. At the same time, you’ll replace that feeling of lack with a feeling of abundance, even if it’s just a feeling of abundant space. (I ask you - who doesn’t feel better with more space?!) On top of that, you’ll have another instance of giving to someone in need or more money in your pocket. (Again I ask - what’s not to like about that?)

If your mind balks at the idea of a rigorous closet cleaning because the little voice is saying, “You won’t have anything to wear if you give away or sell everything in there,” first understand, you can’t or don’t wear them now so what are you really losing? Second, concentrate on what you’ll gain: space and a sense of contribution or money. All good, right? Besides, once you get everything out of there, leaving only what does fit and you do like and wear, I’m pretty sure you’ll be surprised at how much is still in there. And now, you’ll be able to put your hands on them! Even better, when you look at your closet of clothes, all you’ll see are clothes you like, that fit, that make you feel good when you wear them. I dare you - try not to smile at the thought of that! (And what might that be making you smile? A little bit of abundance? Hmmmm?)

Ok, I’m guessing this is starting to make sense, at least where tangibles are concerned. But what about all those intangibles? What about something like stress? Aren’t we just stuck with stress? Sure, we all have a certain amount of stress in our lives caused by things outside our control, but I’m talking about the stress we inflict on ourselves.

When you are stressed out and overcommitted, how did you get that way and how abundant do you feel? When someone asks you to do something that you really don’t want to do or have time to do, but you say ‘ok’ anyway, well…’no’ would have been a better answer for creating an abundance of free time. If you’re trying to concentrate on a project you really need to complete yet you answer the phone every time it rings well…’no’ (letting it go to voice mail or turning the ringer off while you work) would have been a better answer for creating an abundance of completed work. If someone is trying to provoke you by pushing your buttons and you take the bait, well…’no’ (walking away, disengaging from that person) would have been a better answer for creating an abundance of peace in the moment. You can say ‘no’ to stress by saying ‘no’ to the things that cause stress for you.

By clearing out what you don’t want in your life, you create space for what you do want. The Universe abhors a vacuum, so get ready for new things to start arriving! Remember to say ‘no, thank you’ to the things you don’t want, and watch abundance (the good kind) grow!