Ask yourself this simple question to have a more blissful 2017

It’s not “what should my new year’s resolution be?”

I feel that time always behaves differently around December. The days are the same but leading up to the silly season, everything seems to slow down.

The moment 01/01 hits, it accelerates. Suddenly before you know it, January has come and gone.

Gyms have gone through their cycles of being crammed full of hopeful people trying to create “a new me” for the first week, before dwindling back to normal levels once everyone starts work again.

Thousands — maybe millions — of blogs are started by people who swear that “this year will be different”.

I’m not shaming anyone — I was there. I know exactly what it’s like. I want to change too. I’ve wanted to for years.

While I tried many things, there was a recurring theme to what I was doing:

I was biting off more than I can chew.

Do you know the feeling, where:

• everything excites you, so you do a bit of everything?
• as a result, you can’t commit to anything?
• Your overall results are lackluster?
• You do go hard and last maybe a month or two, then you burn out?
• you feel miserable from failing, over and over?

Yeah… that was me.

It was damn tiring to go through this year in, year out. Most frustratingly, time just flew by and I wasn’t growing.

This year, out of frustration, I did something different. I asked myself one question:

“What can I subtract from my life that would make it simpler?”

You see, what was happening in the prior years was that I was trying to do more and be more.

For example, I wanted to be a writer and an entrepreneur. I started a magazine earlier in the year. I didn’t have the capacity to connect with my audience as well as develop a product.

I asked myself this question and out of the two, I chose writer.

I also found that whenever I used my phone, I would feel tired and unhappy. I asked myself the question again.

It was difficult, but I uninstalled Facebook and games from my phone. A lot of the games’ success comes from creating “cycles” where you have to come back to the game to gain something.

It was tiring, time consuming and often frustrating. Facebook is great for staying in touch, but I found that more often than not, I wasted so much time mindlessly scrolling through it. It had to go.

Now bear in mind that I didn’t delete my Facebook account. I’m not disallowing myself to have fun. I’m not going to say I’m never going to become an entrepreneur because I’m a writer first and foremost.

I’m just making these choices now because they impact my life on a daily basis.

Not only am I freer, I’m more alert, engaged and connected with my family. I’m having ideas again, since my mind has more space for thoughts to flow through it.

More importantly, I’m having moments of bliss when I walk through a park and it’s just me in myself.

Doing more is tiring. If you have the energy to start going to the gym every week, or making new friends or learning a new skill, be my guest.

All I know is that for me, I’d rather start by decluttering before I add more to think about to the mix.

It’s harder than it sounds. By nature, I want to do more. I don’t want to miss out on things.

But this year, my greatest change has come from doing less. It means that whatever I am doing, I do it better.

It also means that my happiness is derived from what’s left behind. I’m not attaching my joy to achievements in games (which don’t mean anything anyway). It’s not attached to buying crap that I don’t need either.

So what’s left behind? Family, friends and work that gives meaning to my life, like writing and impacting people from all over the world.

Do you REALLY want change in 2017? Then ask yourself the question:

“What can I subtract from my life that would make it simpler?”

It’ll be the easiest thing you do leading up to the new year, but potentially the most rewarding. Let me know what you eliminate from your life and how it makes you feel. Good luck!