Spring is a prime time to purge emotional clutter — the patterns, behaviors, and beliefs interfering with healthy relationships and ultimately holding us back from living fully.

“Carrying around unresolved issues from the past makes life less enjoyable,” says David Simon, cofounder and medical director of the Chopra Center for Wellbeing in Carlsbad, California. “If you are always nursing these issues, it becomes impossible to be completely open and available to what’s happening in your present.” Plus, these bottled-up emotional needs can grow toxic. “A history of accumulated unmet needs erodes your sense of vitality, self-esteem, and worthiness,” says Simon. To break this cycle, you need to meet the emotion head on, come to terms with it, and move forward — and what better time to do that than the spring?

Choose to address your issues. Looking emotional specters in the eye takes courage, but eventually we reach a turning point where we realize we must address them. “It reaches a point where the pain of ignoring it outweighs the pain of dealing with it,” says Simon. Long before that, however, we can choose to face unresolved emotions and come to terms with them.

Create a safe environment. If the relationships around you are threatening or insecure (for example, power struggles at work or stress in a romantic relationship), you won’t be able to let down your defenses enough to honestly address your thoughts and feelings about an issue. In a charged environment, frank introspection is difficult. Better to remove yourself to a supportive, relaxing place that will give you the distance and security necessary for self-assessment.

A safe space could involve a retreat at a center for yoga, meditation, or health (like The Chopra Center or the Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health in Lenox, Massachusetts) where a trained staff, along with the company of others on the same path, creates a loving atmosphere. Or simply travel to the mountains or ocean for a few days to drink in their serenity. If getting away isn’t possible, create a space at home by setting aside a weekend where you clear your schedule and unplug your phone — whatever helps you disengage from your active and demanding life. From within this safe, cleanse-supporting environment, engage in activities that will help identify your issues. Use the time to write in a journal, listen to soothing music, eat healthy foods, get a massage, and practice yoga or deep breathing. “These things can create the space you need to identify your issues and bring into more conscious awareness both the feelings and the patterns tied to a perpetual sense of emotional stress and lack of fulfillment,” says Simon. Meditation, especially, quiets the inner turbulence that interferes with living life to the fullest. “Ask questions and listen to the deep inner voice for responses; hear something from inside that surprises you,” says Simon. Often during meditation, a memory suddenly bursts into awareness, giving you an insight into your past or the answer to a question you’ve been asking. “That kind of experience gives you the confidence that old patterns don’t have to continue,” he says.

Learn to let go. Create a ritual to release the toxins you’ve identified. This could mean throwing rocks in the ocean, writing a letter and burning it, or calling somebody you’ve been avoiding — anything that symbolizes a shift in patterns and that helps you consciously let go. “We can access and express through ritual things that are oftentimes too challenging, too threatening otherwise,” says Richard Faulds of Kripalu Center. “It’s a way to powerfully express emotion in action.”

Commit to new choices. Once you’ve released your emotional toxins, resolve not to recreate them. “It’s great to have insight and feel some relief, but the long-term benefits of the healing process clearly require making a commitment — it’s too easy to have a relapse,” says Simon. To do this, first create an intention to honor your commitment. Then write down specific, realistic, and measurable goals for the spring to help you achieve that intention.

An emotional cleanse in the spring leaves you feeling rejuvenated and more alive. The whole thing is a process: As summer approaches, you’ll be ready and able to implement new goals. “Then you can magnify that and get momentum going full force in the end of summer,” says Kristi Zimmer, a hydrotherapist and massage therapist from Seattle.