9 Instant Actions to take Right Now for a Simpler Life
When I was a kid, I looked to a magical future where everything was advanced, automated and easy. This is often the vision of how we see our futures. All bright lights, easy and convenient, everything moving forward, rather than backward. Artificial Intelligence doing all the chores so that we have the time to enjoy what we love.
The future is upon us and we are already seeing rapid breakthroughs in AI, virtual reality, and information and automated services at the touch of a button or two. You can answer calls on you Smartwatch, and shop, plan, communicate and monitor all your bodily functions on your Smartphone. However, more and more I am hearing from my audience and clients how complicated life has become. With social media pressures, traditional jobs that cross-over many responsibilities, and confusing news and advancing deep-fakery, nothing seems so straightforward!
I’m here to reassure you that life does not have to be complicated, no matter how modern our world becomes.
Many people seek a simpler life or are already living one.
You don’t need to move to a cottage in the woods to achieve a simpler life, you can do it from wherever you are right now. There are masses of people living this dream and you can too!
9 Instant Actions for a Simpler Life That You Can Take Right Now
Be mindful: Take conscious moments and make yourself aware of the moment. Use your senses to connect yourself with what is happening around you. What can you see? What can you hear? Smell? Feel? Be conscious in what you choose and make positive choices over negative, proactive choices over reactive, constructive choices over destructive.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Run through your senses. Name 3 things you can see, 2 things you can hear, and 1 thing you can feel!
2. Declutter the physical stuff: Get rid of all the duplicates, the things you no longer value, the things you no longer use, the things that take away your valuable space and the ridiculous surface-hogging gadgets that do what you can do with your own two hands and a bit of effort. I have written many blogs to help you do exactly this, including how to manage your sentimental items.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Declutter a space, such as a drawer or surface for 5 minutes!
3. Enjoy simple pleasures: Simple pleasures are free or at least cheap. Enjoying a view, walking in nature, exercising, sitting and reading a book, talking and interacting with your friends and family are the obvious choices.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Enjoy a drink of water, the sound of it filling your glass, how it appears and its cooling taste as you drink it!
4. Find alternate ways to travel and exercise: For the sake of your physical health and the environment, walk, run, ride a bike, use public transport, or carpool. Health should be everyone’s top, or near-top priorities. If you are motivated to spend on experiences that improve your health, such as the gym or other movement classes, do so. You do not have to rely on a gym to get healthy though, the outdoors is free and so too is the space within your home. The important thing is to remain active.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Perform 10 jumping jacks or jog on the spot for 60 seconds to get yourself moving!
5. Get disciplined with your Smartphone: I could tell you to get rid of your phone, but hey, I use my phone every day. It can be a valuable tool for your life. Just remember that it is a tool and not master of your attention. What I can say is that you can organise your phone so there are fewer temptations. Delete the apps that you no longer use. Place your social media at the end of your swipe pages in a group folder. Turn off your notifications and decide to look every hour, or at certain spaced-out times of the day, rather than every moment a notification goes off. In fact, turn off the sound and even the vibration. If someone calls and texts and you miss it, you can get back to them later. Most calls and texts are pretty trivial anyway. Who says you should have to answer immediately? Are you being paid to answer your phone at a moment’s notice, if not, don’t! You choose when you reply.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Turn off at least 3 notifications by going into the settings of your Smartphone!
6. Get rid of your loans and credit cards: Borrowing money simply means that you didn’t save enough of it in the first place. When you have debt, it is not only financial, it affects your wellbeing too. You are also paying a price for your worry, at the expense of your health. Remember the old biblical saying, from Proverbs 22:7, “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender.”
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Cut up a credit card now so you can’t spend on it anymore.
7. Hone your monthly expenses that you just don’t need: Print off your latest bank statement and go through it with a fine-toothed comb. What exactly are you wasting your money on? Is it odd insurance payments and protection plans? Memberships that you hardly use? Subscriptions to stuff that are not worth the cost of your usage? Where is all your money leaking out? Motivate yourself to do a monthly budget that you can physically see and review. Action step: Call up now and cancel something.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Create a budget on any sheet of paper to hand!
8. Meditate: How you go about this is your choice. It is easier than you think. You need to be in the moment, paying attention to what you are doing. If you are recalling the past or dreaming of the future, you are simply not in that present moment. We all have many past and future thoughts during the day; if they are negative, they are an issue, if they are positive, they can be motivating. However, we only live in this very moment and we can train ourselves to do so more with a little conscious awareness and attention. Whether you meditate in a formal way or choose another activity such as moving meditation and exercise, the secret lies in being single-focused to start and then losing all focus as a possible by-product. For example, if you stare at a spot on the ceiling, all kinds of thoughts will pass through your mind; however, there will be occasions when there are simply no thoughts at all for a moment or more. This can be done anywhere, for any length of time and through any method where you are not being distracted by the outside world. Many meditators simply focus on breathing in and out or staring at an object.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Stare at a spot on the wall or ceiling for 1 whole minute and notice your breathing!
9. Weed out what you watch, read and what consumes your time: These days we can’t see our beautiful mental garden because of all the weeds that are growing and the rubbish blowing into it. Be highly selective in how you spend your personal time. Fast food has now become fast tv, fast books and fast entertainment. Production of entertainment has raised dramatically in the past few years. Just the other day I was listening to a presentation when someone proclaimed that they had written 43 books and published them on Amazon in a year!!! What! How is it possible to create quality in such books and then charge the same as a book written over a number of years. We are in a time of fast, junkified, time-wasting, mind-numbing over-stimulation. Saying that, there is a lot of beauty out there to discover amidst the weeds.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Decide on 1 thing you are going to stop watching, reading or doing that is just junk and wasteful of your valuable time!
When our lives are simpler, we have more time and money to enjoy the things we find meaning in or to discover the things that bring us meaning. When we are constantly chasing lower needs such as food and shelter, life is stressful.
We have a choice to take charge of our choices! Choose to only control what you are able, your thoughts and your reactions to events and let go of everything that is outside of your control. You can choose to be positive and proactive, or you can choose to be negative and reactive. The power of living a simpler life resides in the former, not the latter.
DO IT RIGHT NOW: Please share this article with a friend or family member or share with others on Social Media ;)
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