Live Simply.  Easy for you to say.  It seems a great irony to me that living simply needs to be the more intentional way of living these days.  It is an active process of removing unnecessary items and matters from your life, and then having more room for what you really want in life.  This post was a bit tricky for me to write as I am only part-way through my own windy path towards leading a simpler life.  In my own life, I have learned to work with the clothing I use and need and to get rid of the rest.  I have learned to say “yes” more often to exercise and rest and to say “no” more often to work or activities I do not enjoy.  I am working on being more aware of what is happening around me at the moment and so, I find myself somewhat less worried about what will happen in the future.  What I have found so far is living more simply leads to:

• greater ease of movement
• greater concentration
• less stress
• a healthier relationship with money
• making better choices for myself
• fewer accidents, like forgetting to pay bills or tripping over clutter
• less frustration
• more excitement and joy

I believe everything in the list above is a factor in fighting Procrastination.  This makes plain sense to me as Procrastinators tend to have:

• too much on their plate
• too much to think about
• too much stuff to distract them, e.g. clutter to “organize”
• a problematic relationship with money and spending
• few ideas for changing their behaviors because they feel stuck and overwhelmed
• frequent accidents, like burned breakfasts (cue live blogging) and overdue bills
• lots of frustration
• little excitement or joy

If you are not already on a path of simplifying your life, here are a few relatively easy-to-implement suggestions for starting:

Read Be More With Less posts.  Courtney Carver has walked the walk and she now talks the talk.  A great and wise guide towards finding the richness in life, the kind that is not available in shopping malls.

Join her Project 333 movement.  Members of Project 333 choose to dress with 33 items of clothing for 3 months.  Start paying attention to matters in your life that are more important than what you are wearing.

Avoid shopping for a month.  This may not sound easy.  This technique is amazing however at rescuing time from the mall, market, or the web.  You’ll get the benefits right away.  When you don’t spend your time shopping, you get to have your time back.  Your bank account and wallet will be fatter at the end of the month too.  And you won’t have to do any work for that payday.

Say “no” to new obligations for one month.  If you have been prone to offering yourself for new projects, both yours and those of others, stop.  Stop until you have your schedule under your own control and design.  You will feel better in all that you do.

Think of small ways to simplify.  For instance, when you return e-mails, return them quickly and with one-line responses.  Use polite, direct language and the job is done.  Your e-mail burden will feel much less, and again, you will have saved yourself a lot of time over the course of a few days.

Move away from double-booking yourself.  Use a calendar or planner as your friend.  Your really close friend who would never let you make yourself nuts running from one place to the next without a plan or a break.  Use each available time slot for one purpose.  Rest, exercise, eating, sleeping, fun, and work.  Allow yourself room to breathe in each scheduled event and between events too.

Start decluttering.  I say “start” because I know you will likely have more than one month’s clutter to take care of.  Try not to flinch or freak out about having one more thing to do here because this tip is a winner.  It’s another tip that has immediate and long-lasting effects and payoffs.  Scan the room you are in right now (as long as it’s your own room) and figure out what needs to go.  Broken things, unneeded things, unused things.  Any thing you don’t love, use, or need can go.  And when those things go, so do your feelings of being stagnant and stuck.

You can start today on this journey of finding what it means for you to live more simply.  It is a different trip for each of us, but one that will always offer great sights and revelations.

Please share stories of your own movements towards living more simply here.  If you haven't started yet and have questions as to how to begin, share those here too.