Ah yes, I do believe in what we think expands - the good and the bad. That is why I disagree with 'fighting' anything, because instead it would make more sense to love a situation and expand the love which heals.
I have overlooked cleansing secondhand clothes for the energy residue it might hold. This is a good point. It applies to secondhand books etc as well. Funny thing, I had a dream about secondhand books last night. There were a few books I own in the dream and there was two ladies who clearly appeared in the dream as the previous owners of my books. They were trying to get me to buy other books off them. Could it have been caused by energy residue and a psychic link made because of it? I am not sure but I will be smudging all my books today to cleanse the energy of them.