:icon_wink LOL did I grab your attention?

Simpler lives come from a lot of little things that add up to peaceful relaxed living. :bubblebat

Think about decluttering for a minute:

Sometimes when we pursue simplicity and look at things like dejunking, it looks scary because we are afraid of losing the good stuff. We fear getting rid of it all to live simpler then having no life to live, with all that time we just freed up.

Start by zeroing in on "the good stuff". Think about a vacation in a fine hotel, you are living out of your suitcase, and everything is simple and easy to take care of. When you go home, it's complicated.

Why can't you just live out of a suitcase of clothes and a saucepan and a knife to cook with then? Minimalism attempts to move in that direction. But is it really simpler?

AHA! HERE is where it starts to get interesting.

Many people confuse becoming a minimalist with simpler living. Sometimes minimalists are into harder methods and less simple living thru using less. For instance a minimalist will own a knife, whereas simple living might mean a knife and a food processor depending on the person's needs.

For me I own a food processor to make my life simpler and easier. It simplifies the chopping of large quantities of veggies so I can make the soups and salads I like and eat more veggies for my energy level. Thus it adds to my life and simplifies it for me.

You have things like a book collection or a music hobby such as an accordian or piano or flute, or you sew, crochet, knit. Or you like to cook, garden, clean the house easily or look like a Vogue model. Whatever.

These things make you happy. These are the things that you DON'T want to accidently get rid of.

Then there are things like a turkey platter or snowboots or bathing suits that you may not use more than a few times a year, but when you need them, you need them.

You DON'T want to lose those in the pursuit of simplicity. When you need them, it complicates life if you tossed them in a dejunking moment that Don Aslett terms a neatspree.

Neatsprees are what happen when you toss things willy nilly in the pursuit of extreme measures of simplicity and Less is More or minimalist kind of living.

Decluttering on the other hand-----

Spotlights what you find emotionally satisfying or extremely to occaisionally useful stuff and helps you to get rid of the clutter that gets in the way and makes every job take longer from cleaning up to putting things away.

Decluttering for the sake of simplicity is not living a minimalist life, it is paring down, carving out the pure structure of the life you want to lead, with the stuff you like to have.

that was a brief moment thinking about decluttering, but now lets' look at how a few daily routines and changes can add up big for a simpler and less stressful life.

Telephones: using an answer machine can help, but you still have to do call backs. Sometimes it's nice to have a call display showing you who is calling and you can selectively prune which calls to respond to.

Turn down the ringer, turn it off when you need peace for dinner hour and let the answer machine pick up. You can use it to monitor whether or not to pick up, but interrupting dinner preparations or the meal itself is not a serene action.

Use a cordless so you can accomplish small tasks while on the phone visiting.

Use a timer for long winded people and answer it a bit breathlessly, mentioning that your timer will go in 3 minutes, then when it goes, tell them, and ask to continue later. (or whatever time works for you).

I had an aquaintance from church who persisted in thinking that because I once prayed with her for some friend of hers that lived in another city and didn't know from Adam, that I wanted half hour long rambling updates on his life every time she called. She was also prone to wasting 45 minutes telling me about her latest health crisis. I couldn't get a word in edgewise often. I was functioning as her shoulder to cry on.

I don't mind that with my friends, but they usually offer theirs for me too, and this was much more one sided and VERY exhausting to listen to.

I finally had to tell her I didn't have time for that, I needed the readers digest version. I also needed to give her warnings, such as, Nellie, in 5 minutes I have to hang up, give me the short form ok, and when she began to ramble again, Nellie it's 3 minutes, then Nellie I'm sorry but I have to go now, we'll talk again next time.

It worked. I don't allow her longer than 5 minutes and it's amazing how fast she can get to the point now.

That is actually an old psycho therapist's technique. The patient will tell you the most important thing you need to hear, in the last minute before they are supposed to leave. They will piddle around for an hour, then when there is no time left, out it comes. The way you cope is to set limits, by saying, I'm so sorry, we will have to talk about that next time, I'm out of time now.

If you are doing "therapy" for a friend and you notice this pattern you deal with it, by setting the limits like I did with "nellie".

Or realize that you don't have to provide that kind of therapy at all. If they always call you to vent or cry or whatever and it's never both ways, that is a warning that you are simply acting as a pressure relief valve so that the person doesn't have to deal with what is really bugging them.

A good book to help set limits is called "Boundaries" by Dr's Cloud and Townsend. It helped me learn to say no a lot more and do it in a way that didn't harm others.

can be a bit unsettling. I found my nerves better when I read it at my leisure in a paper rather than having my eyeballs assaulted by the visual images of pain and horror every night.

I can skim stuff that is upsetting.

I also find reading a digest of the news or reading news online helps me filter out the upsetting stuff.

I have a few little habits that work with me not against me

Decide on dinner by 9 (am or pm whichever works for you) so you have time to defrost, and hunt for ingredients. Doing a few things to prep veggies and salads at the start of the day, means less stress getting supper on the table at dinner time. Don't stress about loss of vitamins, if it means the difference between eating veggies or not, because it was too hard at supper hour, prep the veggies early and keep them in the diet.

A load a day keeps the doctor away, referring to laundry and dishwashers.

That load of laundry goes in, the previous days, gets transferred to the dryer, and the stuff in the dryer gets put away if I'm really exhausted. If I'm not, then I try to get that load in and thru and put away by bedtime. I wash in hot, rinse in cold so I don't grow mildew overnight if it sits damp overnight.

Dishwashers, it's best to pick a good time to run and stick to it. I find it best to run it at night after snacking season is done. Just before I head for bed. then in the morning I unload as I wait for my eggs or porridge to boil.

Trash out daily. I like to take the kitchen gbg bag out once a day (like the dishwasher, pick a time and stick to it) and I run it thru the house emptying the trash cans into it on my way out to the garage. I usually have a trashcan in each room barring the living room and dining room because then dh and the kids use them and the place stays tidier.

Leave a room better than you find it. Doing bits and bites of the bathroom each time I use it, means it stays almost spotless almost all the time which is a big plus (see my Lady of the Manor prefers simpler cleaning methods for fuller how to). Things like running my wet soapy hands round the sink bowl and rinsing then drying with the hand towel.

When you leave a room, take something with you, whether a mug to the dishwasher or a book to your dd's room. Leave it better than you found it.

Leave the vacuum out. It is easier to use, and if company comes you can shove it back in it's home. This way spills get cleaned up quicker and you can work thru the house in 5 minute bursts if your energy level is bad.

IF you don't overload it.

Learn to block off time for rest and even more time for set up clean up around projects and more time yet for transportation.

In a word Margins. You need margins of time to stay sane. Pencil them in.

Dr's appt at noon on Wed? Takes a half hour to get there? Takes 45 minutes to get ready to leave. You are blocked off from 1045 am. How long do you usually wait? A half hour? Then he takes 15 minutes with you? Then you need to fill a prescription or have some lab work done?

The earliest you'll be out is 12:45 pm.

Now itakes half an hour to get home, even if you didn't have to pick up a prescription. That is now 1:15.

So from 10:45 to 1:15 At the MINIMUM to see the dr.

Looking at the calendar talking with a friend, it looks like it's just noon. 15 minutes either way. So you tell her, you'll be there at half past--1 at the latest. And you are running late, with stress all day because

you didn't remember travel time, getting ready time, and a bit for dr lateness.

Use your calendar to block off family time, time for rest. Keep some clear just for margins to run into if you need it. If you don't then fine. You have a little extra time to rest and relax.

3 things:

Wastebasket
Calendar
and
A GOOD HANGING FILEBOX

You get mail. Junk you toss right away. have a garbage near where you sort mail and just toss most of it right in there.

Invites and stuff with dates you have to remember, you transfer to the calendar.

Stapled onto the back of your calendar, you have a homemade pocket for things like tickets or maps to get there.

Lottery tickets go there too. Clean out regularly.

Bills you have a drawer for. Before tossing in the drawer, write the cheque, postdated for when it should be mailed, then pencil in the due date under where the stamp should go. Stamp it and mail it on payday or whenever you deal with bills.

Receipts and bank statements you file. In your hanging files. Whatever you need for income tax goes in the files. Don't file junk.

Magazines. Cancel what you don't care for. Toss or give away back issues to your dr's office or the hospital waiting rooms, or the rehab unit, but get rid of back issues. I have a few exceptions to that. I get and keep Threads, Knitters and Taste of Home. But I do refer to the back issues and none of them come oftener than 6 times, the Knitters only 4 times a year.

By that I mean, housekeeping priorities go like this for me

Bathrooms for sanitary reasons
Kitchens for food safety and sanitation.
ENTRY WAY is next (it's the first thing someone sees if they come to my door)

then
Living room and dining area because if I have guests unexpectedly it's nice to have a clean tidy space to relax in

then
bedrooms

then other areas.

It helps to concentrate on the rooms in an order like that so that on days when you don't have a lot of time, you can still pull it together for the unexpected.

This is simply the 80 20 rule again.

When we aim for perfect we lose a lot of time and energy that doesn't need to be wasted.

Most (80%) of the BENEFIT or finished work comes from THE FIRST 20% of the effort you put in. Scary thought. You mean, the first 20% of the hour I work on gets most of the work done?????

YES and what is WORSE IS that the remaining WHOPPING 80% of your time and energy will only get you that little 20% better.

What if you stopped there after investing 20% and it's 80% done, not perfect but most ways done??? OK if you are a neuro surgeon we hope you don't. But what if it's something like a floor that you are cleaning. Here is how that breaks down.

You could spend the first 12 minutes (20%) cleaning the kitchen floor, and get most of the worst dirt off. There are a few stuck items, on there and the wax is still pretty good. You will probably find the stuck things either wear off or come up on some future wash. Or in the worst case, once every 2 years when you strip the wax fully.

But supposing you got down on the floor, stripped the wax, scrubbed off each stuck particle, rinsed it perfectly, reapplied the wax and then stood back. You just wasted the remaining 48 minutes chasing after a few specks, and a shine that nobody but you can tell from before.

Now compare doing it for 12 minutes instead of an hour. You save 48 minutes every week, times 52 weeks out of the year.

Once every few months you throw a bit more wax on, to bring back the shine as needed. 5 minutes.

Once every 2 years you strip the floor completely and put an hour into it, you are still ahead. Only this time, you are spending a bit of time, once in a while investing in sealing the floor finish so the wax stays on better and you have an easier time cleaning in your weekly 12 minute efforts.

(I take a lot less than 12 minutes, but for me it's more like 2 minutes or less per day wiping up the odd coffee spill, and vacuuming the dog hair and grit up whenever the vacuum is out and I'm doing the living and dining areas, I even swing the vac into the fridge to keep from cleaning that too often as well)

OK lets look at a few other areas we may need to simplify our lives temporarily but have been bogged down by the guilt at not being perfect--

environmental action. It's great to have a compost heap, and it's great to recycle but if these become difficult to keep up due to a current health problem or a current time crunch, sometimes it's better to ditch the guilt, and let the stuff hit the landfill till you are better again.

Simplify life, toss it is better than hanging onto the garbage hoping you'll feel up to recycling, while the pile gets higher and higher and you feel less and less able to deal with it.

I'ts ok to toss things in the trash, and get a head start again. When you feel better, get back the routine. Meanwhile if it keeps you healthy, losing the guilt over not recycling every last thing in the house will be cheaper than therapy, and drugs to help rebuild your sanity or your energy.

energy savings. Ok it's usually important to save electricity and water by not running the dishwasher every night whether it's full or not.

BUT if it starts to become a problem, where losing the routine, means you get behind, then look again. Maybe the slight cost in energy and water to run the dishes every evening is more than made up for by the feeling of relief at being able to maintain a routine cleaning chore.

Which means that you can save energy elsewhere. And do stuff that benefits the environment more, such as using homemade cleaners or non toxic cleaners. Why can you do that? because you saved your energy for where it counted more.

Frugality-- say you save a whopping dollar by making your own laundry soap. It cost you 20 minutes to do it. That is 3$ an hour for your labour.

You make soap 4 times a year or so, lets say so your annual savings is 4$

But say because you got tired making the soap, you werent' able to throw beans in the crockpot, didn't feel up to the effort, but the cooked beans vs canned would have saved you 4$ for the same 20 minutes effort (put in crockpot, fill with water, turn on, rinse and pack in baggies and freeze flat on cookie sheets). You are earning 12$ for an hour of your labour doing that.

You eat beans twice a week lets say and each crock gives you 2 weeks worth, so your annual savings is 8$ per month or a WHOPPING $96$ YOU SAVED PER YEAR

If it gets down to it, you need to prioritize. On an ANNUAL BASIS The cooking of beans nets you far more benefit than chasing the pennies for laundry detergent.,-- $96.oo versus 4 $

Where are you spending your time, and energy.

Simplify and save

Very interesting and always helpful. Thank you

This is wonderful information - never out of date!

Quaker Anne

Great posts, very informative!

I like this too!