Spring Cleaning Your Kitchen By Guest Blogger Sarah Bergstein

As technology, social media, and our hyper-connectedness are ever present in our lives today, each year we go through waves of content from every which direction about surviving the holidays, shredding for summer, and of course, now, Spring cleaning. 

So instead of talking about HOW to Spring clean your kitchen, as you can find that anywhere right now, I want to talk to you more about the WHY and what that can or might look like for you. 

The coming of a new season brings millions of changes—one of them typically being our mindset. For those of us who live where the winters get cold and dark, we begin to feel a sense of “waking up” as the temps increase and the days get longer. We take a deep breath in and feel renewed...we feel hope. This is happening within us even if we’re not fully tuned in to it. 

This year, maybe instead of paging through the magazines and searching the blogs and scrolling through social media making a mental laundry list of the things you need to do and all the foods you need to “cut out” and the diet you need to get on, perhaps this Spring we look within. Instead of letting the outside world dictate how we should look and feel—turn inward and ask yourself, “What do I need to come alive?” 

Feel free to sit with this for some time, taking time to explore what will serve you. There may be several areas of your life where you feel you could use some sprucing—in your relationships, at work, finding a hobby, getting back to that fitness routine, journaling intentionally...what have you. 

In the kitchen, this might look like a good deep cleaning, throwing away older foods or condiments, or reorganizing counter tops, cabinets, and drawers. Maybe it looks like a fresh coat of paint or some new tableware or adding a few plants or growing a small window herb garden. Whatever it is—let’s approach our kitchen spring cleaning with the same mindset we approach all else—“What would serve me best here?”

Now WHY does this concept matter, as I mentioned I’d address? Framing this question for ourselves allows us to think about how we want to FEEL. Do you want your space to feel brighter or less cluttered? Do you want it to feel cleaner? Do you need to feel more organization? Taking a step further and looking within our fridge and pantry—how do you want to FEEL based on what you eat? Do the foods in your home make you feel energized, satisfied, healthy, beautiful, and whole? As you consider this, set an intention not for perfection, but of intentionally choosing foods that make you feel positive energy, not the opposite. 

The bigger picture for Spring cleaning our kitchen—and our lives—is to improve the way we feel...how we feel in our space, how the foods we eat make us feel, and how we then feel about ourselves when we go out into the world each day. 

No matter what actions or tasks you choose to tackle for your kitchen Spring cleaning this year, may I suggest we do them out of love for ourselves and nothing else. 

Happy Spring, friends. May we all come alive. 

Sarah Bergstein is a Certified Personal Trainer, Fitness Nutrition Specialist, and Certified Life Coach who works with Entrepreneurs and Leaders to help them master their health so they can run their business and their teams and change the world. With over five years in the fitness industry, Sarah has experience with dozens of forms of training, and has coached athletes, weight loss clients, recovering disordered eating clients, and senior and youth clients. She’s most known for her customized and individually-tailored Healthy Boss VIP Training program and her expertise in Meal Prep and teaching busy people how to prepare healthy meals to save time, money, energy, and stress. Sarah served as an active duty U.S. Air Force officer and Public Affairs director for more than five years in Guam, Delaware, and Florida. Learn more about Sarah and her work here.