These 5 Ways Will Make Your Life Easier
“Life is easy. Why do we make it so hard?”
I’ll be honest here. I have a busy life. I don’t have much spare time for myself. Every time I happen to see a 2-hour “aesthetic morning routine or evening routine” from a Youtuber, I admire them while wondering how they have all the time to do that daily (If it’s true in their real life). I also learn some tips and hacks from books and the Internet to make my life easier. But no amount of tips can wave a magic wand and make life completely stress-free. I think that goes pretty much for all of us.
Life will still be hard and busy sometimes, for sure. But after years of learning and practicing, I believe these 5 simple but effective ways will make life so much less stressful for you if you consistently do it over time. They may not all be right for you, take what you can, adapt how you like, apply what suit you, and make any adjustments as you wish as long as it fits with your current stage of life.
1. Simplify your spending. It’s cliché but it won’t stop being true if you want an easy life.
It can’t be denied that money is a necessity in our life, no matter what lifestyle you adopt, minimalism or consumerism. For some of us, managing it can be stressful sometimes. I know it sounds cliché, but spending intentionally will help you stay away from struggling with bills and dealing with debts.
· “Pay yourself first” or pay the debt first before thinking about spending on other things.
· Create a monthly budget to keep track of your savings and spending. But don’t be stingy with yourself. Simple living means encouraging you to focus on what’s really important to you, not becoming an ascetic.
· Overcome the temptation of amazing sales
· Make a list of what you need to buy. When you wander in the supermarket and happen to see things you want to buy but are not on the list, just don’t buy them.
· Ask yourself if what you’re buying is adding value or adding redundancy to your life.
2. Don’t be a drama queen and complicate things
Stop making things more complicated than they really are. You should be aware that all thoughts in your head may not be the truth. According to my experience, many of our thoughts are stories we make up in our minds. Simply based on what we assume, we sometimes just jump to conclusions without verifying the truth. Consequently, we may create a hell of dramas in our lives for nothing.
Next time, when you are inclined to complicate things more than they really are, take a deep breath, step back and be an observer of the situation (not the person involved). This way you can focus your attention on the truth itself, not on the truth that you imagine in your head.
3. Just make decisions anyway
I’m the type of person who strives for perfection. It doesn’t bring me any good. Many of us often get stuck assessing the pros and cons or pondering the best solution to something. Instead of coming up with a good decision, we often end up procrastination.
Next time when you want to procrastinate, keep in mind that doing nothing is also an action. When you decide to put things off, you make a decision to create a mental burden, besides the problem is still not solved.
If you have a dilemma, list down the pros and cons, then follow the result. If you still don’t have the answer, just follow your intuition. You are already the master of your body and mind. Sometimes you already know what to do, the question is:” Do you trust your guts?”
4. Learn to say NO to things you WANT
I know it’s been repeated so many times on the Internet that stop saying yes to things you don’t really want. But sometimes, you also have to say NO to things that you want.
“In the end, creativity isn’t just the things we choose to put in, it’s the things we choose to leave out. “— Austin Kleon
We have to accept that we can’t have and can’t do everything we want in life. Define your priority, and choose wisely what you’ll let into your life and what you keep out. Then have fun. No more thinking, no more worrying about choices you make.
What if you think you chose wrongly? Simply choose again. After all, life is not all about hard work, and making big goals and plans, it’s also about having fun, right?
“What makes us interesting isn’t just what we’ve experienced, but also what we haven’t experienced.” — Austin Kleon
5. Letting go of control is a hard lesson. Accept it.
“If you accept life in all its fullness and ambiguity, it’s not complicated; it’s only complicated if you don’t accept it.” -Marty Rubin
We live in a complex world. Changes and challenges might constantly come into our lives and make us wonder “why is it happening to us?”. It can be very hard to find the right answer. Even if we can find the answer, chances are we may not be able to change the situation. The only way we can do, if we want to have a peaceful life, is to let go of controlling everything and simply learn to accept it the way it is. No judgment of good or bad.
“Accept things that we cannot change; courage to change the things we can; and wisdom to know the difference” is a hard lesson for us to learn. But simply “accept” that it’s hard and all we can do is to keep on learning for a lifetime.
Final Thoughts
I don’t know who you are or how your life is going on, but I surely know one thing: You will always have challenging times in your life. The more complicated you make it, the harder your life will be. The more you focus on simplifying things, the more peaceful life you have.
“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them — that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” — Lao Tzu
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