How to Simplify Your Life

July 22, 2016

For today’s Fix-It Friday we are talking about different ways to simplify your lifestyle and become a minimalist. Less is more… less stuff = less stress, less to clean, less spending and greater happiness.

Step 1: Get Inspired and Really Commit

Last week, we talked about creating an inspiration board to keep you inspired.  Well here is your first use for an inspiration board if you haven’t made one yet.  Search for pictures of what you want your living space to look like. For this, your inspiration board could be a real board or a Pinterest board.

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Have you heard of The KonMari Method? Well reading The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing is a great source of inspiration for living minimal. This method explains how to discard, organize, declutter and tidy up the right way. It inspires you to make living minimally an actual lifestyle, not a once in a life thing.

Step 2: Discard

The best way to do this is to start with the area that stresses you out.  If you are able to tackle the biggest cause of stress it will give you the momentum you need to keep going. You will know that you can do this.  I kind of hit on this step in a previous blog about getting your life organized.  When discarding here are the questions to ask yourself: do I really need this? Do I have something similar?  Have a designated donation spot in your home to put the items in to donate that you don’t need (have used in 6 – 12 months), are just taking up space, or something you have a duplicate to. So instead of thinking about it as discarding, think about it as giving it to someone who can actually use it and who needs it.  I really look at it as a donation to people in need, and remember that I had no use for that item for months or years and they will use it immediately.

Step 3: Maintaining Your Clutter Free Environment

Since we are always in “need” of something, having that donation spot is essential to maintaining a simple life.  Go around your house at least once a month following Step 2. Some tips for this is to only bring home or take what you know you will use or the one in one out method.  Whenever I plan to make any kind of purchase, whether food or clothing, I strategize how I’m going to use it. For food, I only buy what I will need for that week, unless it’s a staple that I will use often (sugar, cooking oil, seasonings, etc.) For clothing, I go onto Pinterest or look at what I already own to see what potential use (outfits) I will have for that item.  If it’s something I have nothing to wear  with, unless I’m buying the entire outfit, I don’t purchase it because I know it will just sit in the closet unused.  With the one in one out method, every time you purchase something, you discard (donate) something else. This way, you are only keeping a certain amount of that object in your home.

 

P.S.  Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful.

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