Three key takeaways from Less Doing, More Living are to create an external brain to save space in your own, customize your life to save time and even make money, and use upper and lower limits to trade quantity for quality.
Confession time: I have too many open tabs on my computer. I don’t close them because I’m not finished with them yet, and I don’t want to forget to return. Do you know what happens more times than I care to admit? I forget/can’t find it and open a new tab. Scrolling through my open tabs is akin to driving down International Blvd in Orlando, where you see a Walgreens every ½ mile or so. Every 25 tabs, there’s another inbox, social media tab, Google Drive… My IT computer husband reminds me that my processing speed slows down the more tabs I have open. I jokingly reply that my computer should be able to keep up with my brain because if that many tabs are open, there are also many open loops in my head. The irony isn’t lost on me. I miss deadlines because too many open tabs allow me to delay decisions. Author Ari Meisel shares several tips to help remove so much information from my brain to allow for better optimization. I’m looking forward to using those tips AND drastically reducing the number of tabs open on my computer. I’m gracefully challenging myself to grow by closing at least ten daily. While it might take me several weeks to complete this activity, I’m pacing myself. This issue didn’t occur overnight and won’t be fixed quickly either.
Another takeaway is taking advantage of the ability to customize almost anything to fit our needs. This can be taken literally or figuratively. I’m a huge believer in structured flexibility. In creating the structure, we must progress with the flexibility needed to fit your lifestyle. From homeschooling to the content I produce, I love to remind people to find what works for them, even if it means creating a custom year-in-review template based on a template.
Finally, using upper and lower limits or setting boundaries enhances your life.
I’ve stopped bringing my laptop to my bedroom to protect my sleep. It’s so easy for me to work just a little longer when the house is quiet. And the issue is it’s so easy to do so at the expense of my sleep! When the computer is with me, if I awake in the middle of the night, it’s easy to hop on and get an hour or two of work done before going back to sleep. OR, I can go back to sleep. What started as a quick trip to the bathroom or shift in position can become a 2-hour interruption. It’s easy to unintentionally create new routines and underestimate the impact of routines that break our sleep. What boundaries can you implement to improve your quality of life?
I encourage you to read this book and see how implementing a few automations can positively impact your life this year. Whether or not you can join me for the discussion on Sunday, January 28th, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the book. Feel free to leave them in the comments.