6 Ways to Simplify Your Life
Written by Ellen Hogan
Time for some SPRING CLEANING. This week’s blog talks all about how to simplify both your workday and free time to give yourself the mental space to breathe and smell those lovely spring flowers (which'll probably make you sneeze, if you’re anything like me. HAPPY HAYFEVER Y’ALL!)
SIMPLIFYING YOUR WORKDAY
1. Choose 3 priority tasks for the day
If you’re anything like us, your email is going off all day, every day with tasks to work on. One way to prevent overwhelm is to choose the three most important projects for the day that absolutely MUST get done. These three tasks should be prioritized above all others, starting the day with them and giving them your full focus and attention. In between, you can take some time to respond to other emails, knock out a few small tasks, or take a quick break. If you’re working on a long-term project, break it down into three segments that you can realistically pull off in a day.
2. Cool it with the to-do lists
In the same vein, don’t make daily to-do lists that you can’t realistically get done. If you’re going off of a week-long to-do list, cool. Do you, homie. But don’t write a list of 30 unimportant things to get done just to feel good about yourself. Long to-do lists can make you feel productive when you check things off. But if you’re not getting anything IMPORTANT done, that can be dangerous. BE REALISTIC!
3. Stop trying to multitask
I have bad news for you, multitasking isn’t a real thing. Doing multiple things at once just makes you ineffective at all of them. If you want to be truly productive, you have to focus on one thing at a time. (I’m telling this to myself too). This also goes for free time. Why do we need to be on Instagram AND texting while we’re watching Netflix? Then we’re not really doing any of them, we’re just half-doing them. Speaking of free time...
SIMPLIFYING YOUR FREE TIME
4. Take at least one night to yourself per week
Give yourself some solo time, even if you’re an extrovert like us and you love to spend time with other people. This will let you get alone with your thoughts and recuperate from all the interactions of the previous few days. Think of it as a REBOOT to your system. If you have a spouse or kids, this is a lot trickier. But even a little time to yourself is so good for your mental health. What you do with that time is totally up to you (take an extra long shower, watch a movie, or clean your house… whatever re-energizes you and sets you up for success later)
5. Have your go-to meals
Find some meals that you LOVE and always have the ingredients for them on hand. Ideally, these will be easy and use few ingredients (bonus points if some recipes use the same ingredients as one another). This way, when you’re busy or stressed, making a delicious and healthy meal doesn’t feel like an undertaking. You can choose one simple option and whip it up quickly without even thinking about it. Cooking on autopilot is great (as long as you don’t burn your house down in the process).
6. Set out your clothes/gear
Setting out your clothes and workout gear the night before will make you way more likely to actually workout. It takes less than a minute, but it makes your morning much easier and nixes the excuse of being too tired to get things together in the morning. This can also apply to medication or breakfast. You don’t need to spend a ton of time every night preparing for the morning, but a couple little tweaks can make your mornings a lot easier, especially if you’re like me and hate getting out of bed.
I hope you enjoyed this week’s tips to kick off Neat & Tidy month! Let’s get that spring cleaning on and simplify our lives a bit this month.
