TIPS FOR LIVING A MORE MINIMAL LIFESTYLE
You can hear the audio version of this discussion on my podcast at Lola’s Frugal Life Podcast, on Apple Podcast, and many other platforms!
WHY TRY TO BE MORE MINIMAL?
Before we get into the tips on how we can live a more minimal lifestyle I thought it would make sense to talk about why we might want to do that. Just to be clear, I am not a minimalist. I definitely love the idea of having less, but I have a lot. I’m not on a mission to get down to the bare minimum in order to live. But, I definitely try the best I can to work on getting rid of things that clutter up our life. Those are not always physical things.
When I think about being more minimal, it’s not only in the things that we have. It is also in the things we have to do, and the activities we participate in. The more we can get rid of what is not so important to us, the more we can focus on the things that really matter.
NO RULES
How minimal you get is up to you. There is no right or wrong. And you do not have to be minimal in all areas of your life. You can pick and choose what works for you. Maybe you really love and are totally in control of your large wardrobe. But you want to drastically cut back on what is on your calendar. Or maybe you are the opposite and really love having a jam-packed calendar. But you are tired of having to decide what to put on each day. It is all about figuring out what you want and what you prioritize in your life.
WHERE TO START
Like with most things we do, it’s best to make changes slowly and thoughtfully. When we take this approach it is much more likely for the changes we have made to stick and actually make a difference rather than just be another thing we tried to do that didn’t work out. So, before you decide to make some changes to live a more minimal lifestyle, you will want to decide where to start and what would have the biggest impact. What is it that stresses you out most in life? This is probably a good place to start. Is there anything you can do to reduce the aspects of your life that are the most stressful to you?
MINIMIZE IN YOUR HOME
Do you really love all of the things that you have in your home? Sometimes we just get used to having certain things and don’t think much about them. We often have things in our homes that we don’t really use anymore. When we get rid of those items it helps free up more space to enjoy the things we do love. To become a little more minimal, you don’t have to overhaul your home. What is one area that you could improve by limiting what you have? Do you have too many plates, bowls, storage containers, or anything else that doesn’t fit nicely in the cabinet?
Maybe you have too many spices or special ingredients that you don’t really use. Often we think there is nothing that we can really get rid of to free up space until we take the time to actually take a look. We might think that we need an excess of something, more cups, more utensils. But, it is actually much easier to keep everything nice when we have just what we need with maybe a slight bit more just in case.
MINIMIZE YOUR MEAL PLANNING
If you find you are spending too much time trying to decide what you will eat each week, this might be an area that you can simplify. There are many different methods of meal planning. Some people like to know exactly what they will be cooking each day, and others plan more loosely as far as what they will cook during the week, but not specifically which night. If you try out some different methods of meal planning, one will probably work for you so that you can cut back the amount of time you spend to figure out what you will cook and what you need to buy at the grocery store.
I use a rotation of similar meals days of the week and then fill in Friday – Sunday with other recipes that I frequently make. Sometimes I add new recipes when I have time, but if I don’t have time or energy to look for something new I still have a meal plan to follow. I heard one meal planning method where you make note cards in categories to pick from. For example, one might be proteins, one might be vegetables, etc. You then mix and match the options that you have on the cards to create meals for the week. The more you can minimalize your options of meals to choose from, the easier it will be to meal plan.
MINIMIZE YOUR COOKING
Unless cooking is one of the things that you really love to do, this is one of the areas that we can usually simplify in our lives. One way you can simplify cooking is by simplifying the recipes you are cooking. There are so many great recipes that are quick to make and have few ingredients. If you find that you are spending more time in the kitchen each night cooking, maybe you could consider looking for recipes with fewer ingredients. Or maybe some recipes with less prep time. You don’t necessarily how to simplify the recipes that you make every night, but if you find you have a night or two that are usually a little bit hectic, you could make sure to plan the quicker recipes for those nights.
HOUSEHOLD CHORES
Household chores are one of those things that I am always looking to minimize and simplify. I don’t mean that I want things in my house to be less clean. I am just always looking for the best way to lessen the amount of time I have to think about what cleaning needs to be done. Cleaning is not something that comes naturally to me and I overthink what I should be cleaning and how often each thing should be cleaned and what needs to be cleaned the most. I would spend too much time thinking about what needed to be done and have less time to actually clean.
One way to minimize the amount of time you put into figuring out what to clean is to follow some type of cleaning schedule. What is working for me is that I identified what must be cleaned each week, pretty much the kitchen and bathrooms need to be kept clean always. So, I have built keeping these clean into my daily routines.
The first thing I do every morning is clean up the kitchen, I know many people do this at night, but I am a morning person and the last thing I want to do at night is clean. Then each Monday on my lunch break I clean the bathrooms. I am fortunate to work from home several days a week now. In the past, I used to clean the bathrooms before work on a certain day. By building those into my schedule, I know that the most important cleaning gets done each week without spending any time thinking about it.
CLEANING SYSTEMS
For the rest of the cleaning tasks, I used to follow the fly lady system where each week you are in a different zone and you work on tasks in that zone. Whatever you don’t finish during the week allotted for a zone gets done next time. I liked this system for a while, but there were too many times when I didn’t get much done in a zone, and then felt like a whole month would have to go by until I got back to a particular area again. Meanwhile, I would stress over what didn’t get done and when I was going to get it done. What is working for me now is an app called Tody.
The concept is similar to the fly lady system in that there are zones and you identify tasks in each zone. Each task has a frequency of how often you want to complete the task. Since I never am fully on top of having all cleaning tasks as often as I would ideally like to get them done, I can look at a list of what needs to be done either by zone or just in general. When I look at the general list, it will show me the tasks throughout my home that are most in need of being done. For me, this has really helped minimize the amount of time I spend thinking about what to do in the amount of time I have for cleaning because it gives me the tasks that are the highest priority.
MINIMIZE YOUR CLOTHING
How do you feel about clothing? If you are more concerned about having something presentable and comfortable to wear, rather than always having something new and different. This might be a place you can consider minimizing in your life. For me, this has had a major impact. Once I realized that it was totally ok to basically wear the same thing almost every day and that no one really cared it made such a big difference for me. I have gotten to a point where I have only clothes that I love in my drawers. So, I can basically put anything on and be good with it.
I cut back on the number of clothes and actually bought several of the same leggings and shorts. I work from home several days a week. Most days I wear black leggings with long side pockets that I can slip my phone. And in the summer I wear shorts made by the same company, with the same long side pockets. I love the side pockets because I am often listening to an audiobook or podcast, so it’s so easy to keep my phone with me no matter what I am doing. I chose to just get black pants/shorts because then I can have a couple of different color tops that all go with the bottoms. Another benefit is that I was able to drastically cut back on the amount of clothing I have in my dresser and closet.
MINIMIZE YOUR TO-DO LIST
Often our to-do lists can be an overwhelming list of an enormous amount of things. Many of those things might never get done. We often put things on our to-do list that we would like to do in a perfect world. Often, there just isn’t time to do certain things. If those things are not priorities, they will likely get passed on for more important tasks.
To minimize your to-do list look through it and cross tasks that you know will never become a priority. Having an excess of things on your to-do list can make you feel overwhelmed. And this can make you feel like you are always trying to catch up. So, periodically going through your to-do list and trimming it down to a realistic list can often make you feel less weighed down.
Another way you can minimize your to-do list is to create a separate list each week. This list should contain only the things you can realistically get done or get started on during the current week. By having a list for the week, or the day, you can more easily focus on accomplishing the items on your list. Reviewing a master list each time you need to decide what to work on next isn’t always the best idea. There end up being too many things to choose from. Try to create a minimal list from your master list to work on over a shorter period of time. This will lessen the amount of time spent reviewing and making decisions about the things on your master list.
WHAT IS MOST IMPORTANT TO YOU
If none of the topics I covered today are areas that you feel stressed about, then you have already done a good job of simplifying where you can. Or you might just enjoy the amount of time that you put into these areas of your life. Minimizing should not be done just for the sake of doing it. This is a tool that can be used to reduce stress in your life. It allows you to have more time to enjoy the rest. Take time to think if there is anything you would like to make easier or eliminate and start there!
Thanks so much for checking in! If you would like to hear the podcast version of this topic to check out Lola’s Frugal Life Podcast! Also, be sure to check out my other blog posts on this site!
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