Living in a world that promotes consumerism can be a bit overwhelming at times. It’s difficult to be happy with what you have rather than buying the latest and greatest product. This is especially true when the newest product allows you to send texts with special effects or funny emojis. Or, maybe it works twice as fast as the current product you have. Buying these new products and holding on to your old ones can lead to a cramped space. Even if you don’t buy the newest products, it’s common for people to buy items that they don’t need.
Whatever the case, you probably have a few places in your life that feel a little cluttered. Thankfully, you can simplify your life without giving up everything that you enjoy, which will also make room for things that are truly important.
Simplify Your Space
The best place to start your simplification is with your physical space. When you’re able to declutter your home (or even just a part of it), the space will feel less cramped. In the process of clearing out the chaos, you’ll also notice that you’re able to find the items you need more easily. Those items are also less likely to be misplaced when you have an organized space.
In a house (or room) that is free of clutter, it almost feels like you can think more clearly. In fact, your environment frequently influences the way you feel mentally and physically. So, putting forth the effort to simplify your living space is well worth the benefit it’ll have on your psychological well-being. On top of minimizing the chaos throughout your rooms, you can also maximize the room inside your head.
Simplify Your Mind
One way to simplify your life is to eliminate thoughts and problems that make it complicated. Keep thoughts that create stress and anxiety out of your head. Any form of self-doubt or self-deprecation should be replaced with a healthy thought. When you begin to worry about your self-image and question your self-worth, remind yourself that you bring value to the world and to the lives of those around you. If you need others to help boost your confidence, ask the ones closest to you for support. Or, if you don’t want the help of others, try keeping a journal for your discoveries of self-love and gratitude. This way you can read a past entry for inspiration when you’re feeling low.
Practice daily affirmations to dig yourself out of the negative and unproductive trenches. Your positive affirmations can be as simple as telling yourself, “My thoughts and ideas are valuable,” or as specific as, “I’m going to rock this meeting today and make sure everyone sees the value I bring to this organization!” Often, it’s not thoughts about ourselves that get us down, but thoughts about the struggles we have in life. Whether it’s our friends, finances, or time, we can make changes to improve every aspect of our life, making them simpler and a smaller source of worry.
Simplify Your Connections
We all have various methods of connecting to others and sometimes those methods (or the people they connect us to) can be a bad influence. If you have friends or family who tend to be the source of more problems than solutions, consider reevaluating your relationship with them. You don’t need to remove them from your life completely, but it might be worth setting new boundaries with them. If the people in your life aren’t a problem, but your means of communication are, consider creating only two means of communication—texts and phone calls. Log out of your social media and delete the app. Or if you’re feeling like you need a full reset, delete your social media accounts altogether. Do whatever you need to make sure that your life feels less complicated and stressful.
Simplify Your Finances
It’s not uncommon to be stressed out by money management. One of the best ways to feel more relaxed is to get your finances in order. Start keeping track of your spending and your income and separate what’s absolutely necessary from what isn’t. Once you determine where your money is going and where it should be going, you can begin to make a budget. Plan for what you would like to spend or save, and where that money can be best used.
Simplify Your Time
Busy lives typically have a high demand for effective time management systems. If you lead a busy life and are not great at managing your time, this may be a large source of frustration. Getting a clear schedule put into place will help you manage your time more efficiently and allow you to visualize what you have time for and what you don’t. When determining this, remember to separate your urgent tasks from your important tasks.
Urgent tasks are the ones that require immediate attention but don’t necessarily get you closer to your goals. Important tasks sometimes require more focus and energy but contribute highly to your goals and your values. Important tasks also include daily habits that lead to long term accomplishments. When you start to see the difference, you can then prioritize the important actions and plan your day around them instead of the urgent.
Consider using one of these time management apps. You could also invest in a large calendar to easily view your month at a glance! Whichever resource works better for you, commit to using it and let it determine your schedule. This level of structure will help eliminate the feeling that you don’t have enough time. Instead, you’ll think, “I can clear up some space for this in my schedule.”
ASAP (As Simple as Possible)
Life isn’t always simple. You’ll face many difficult decisions and complicated situations. But, when those moments of anxiousness and stress arise, the advice above will help keep the rest of your life calm and collected. With a mind free of clutter and a space that’s a little less chaotic, you’ll be able to find serenity, even when life throws you curve balls.
Sometimes even vacations can feel complicated and need to be simplified. Read our blog to find out how you can make your next vacation truly relaxing.
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