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Slow Down and Live the Life You Love

Guest post by: Terri Levine

Article Overview: Tips and tricks for eliminating the unnecessary and making room for time to stop and smell the roses and take back control of your life.

Slow Down and Live the Life You Love

Do you find yourself wanting more time to slow down and enjoy your life? Are you feeling the need to accomplish more? We all want more time, more money, more love and more satisfaction. It is hard to balance all the things we want when there is so much to juggle. Chances are that your life is packed full with to-do lists, commitments, projects and problems. When you're this busy, you are missing out on living your life. Your life is just happening around you. You can begin to improve your life in the areas of work, home and community when you begin to slow down. The process of slowing down will put you back in touch with yourself and you'll be able to find your values once again. You'll even find you will begin to reclaim your life and your dreams.

Here are three steps to help you slow down and enjoy your life. First, permanently eliminate three tasks, responsibilities, projects, goals, routines or commitments that aren't necessary. If you do volunteer work that you feel obligated to do, give it up. Let it be somebody else's turn. If you make your own home repairs, hire them out. Just because you can do it doesn't mean you have to! If you are involved in social events that you no longer enjoy, get out of them. We change as we grow! If you dream of driving the Lexus or owning an expensive home, let the dream go. Success isn't just about the cost of our home or car!

Now you are ready for step two, which is to delegate, eliminate or organize 10 tasks. If you are spending time doing your own taxes, hire a CPA instead. If you clean your own home, hire a house cleaner so you don't have to do this task. If you prepare the family meals, find a place to pick up healthy meals or find someone to prepare and deliver them, two or three times a week so you aren't in the kitchen every evening. Install Quicken to manage your checkbook with ease. Find a dry cleaner that delivers so you don't have to pick up your clothing. Hire a personal coach instead of pondering, contemplating, considering, but not doing.

Finally, if you are like most people, you have some type of daily to do list. To do lists can be anything from post-it notes to expensive day planning systems. You probably can't imagine not needing such a system. How will you possibly plan your day? Well, if you are really serious about enjoying your life then you must give up that daily list that keeps growing.

Here are some tips for letting go of the to do list ritual. When you think of a to do, ask yourself if it is something that you really have to do or is it something you can hire someone else to do, or delegate or simply eliminate? Set up a simple reminder system to keep track of when to mail out birthday and anniversary cards, note important social events or business meetings. This system can be a calendar, birthday reminder book, or data base contact system. Won't it be better to experience each day in the present rather than reacting to the next item on your to do list? Keep the important information in a system but forget the to do list!

As you simplify your life, you will find you begin to make different choices. Instead of life running you, you are designing your life. You'll notice what you have been missing because you were too busy and out of control to experience your own life. Although you can select the pace at which you want to simplify, those who tend to do it in bits and pieces never make it through the process because they lose momentum. So just go for it! When your life is full, you miss out on life. Start enjoying your life today!

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Article Tags: relax, relaxation, slowing down, taking it easy, todo lists, work life balance



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