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In today’s world of non-stop stimulation and productivity, it’s no wonder that many of us are dreaming of a simple life.
The simple living movement is a response to an environment that’s gotten a bit out of control – information overload, overconsumption of cheap products and food, jobs that can reach you at any time of day, jam-packed activity schedules for kids, and constant reminders of a million things you “should” be doing.
In order to truly create a simple life, you may at some point want to overhaul your career, living situation, habits, and so on.
But you don’t have to do it all at once. I wrote previously about easy steps you can take today to simplify your life.
To build on that, I wanted to share some “normal” things I quit to start creating my simple life. For so many years, I didn’t realize that I could simply opt out to reduce my stress and overwhelm. And the results are more astounding than you’d think.
1. Habit Tracking
These days, several apps can help you track habits. And I used one religiously. I thought I was motivating healthy behaviors by getting scientific about recording my habits.
And there are so many daily habits you can convince yourself to track. Water intake, exercise, study, hygiene, housework, reading. The list goes on.
When I discovered essentialism, I realized I was tracking too much. By focusing on so many little things, I was spreading my efforts too thin. I wasn’t making significant progress in any one direction. Sure, maybe I was doing one DuoLingo lesson, 50 sit-ups, and reading 5 pages of a book every day. But what was that really accomplishing? It was giving me an illusion of progress.
I noticed something similar in the early 2010s, when step tracking apps became popular. Everyone I knew who used one to track their 10,000 daily steps gradually gained significant weight over the course of the first year they had it. My theory is that the apps were providing the illusion that they were doing exercise. And they could therefore eat more. When in fact, they would have been walking that much daily even if they weren’t tracking.
I stopped habit tracking for that reason. But a side effect was starting my journey towards a simple life.
Instead of keeping a mental count of every action, I started living in the moment. Not to mention, I wasn’t pulling out my phone constantly to track behaviors – and then getting sucked into mindless scrolling and checking notifications.
And believe it or not – the habits that mattered stayed. I found that I still did the things I cared about daily. It was easy to remember to do things that truly had meaning to me. And that’s the core of intentional living.
2. Multiple Kid Activities on Weekends
One of the most common complaints you’ll hear from parents in the U.S. is that they feel like a chauffeur for their kids. Especially on weekends. Instead of pursuing their own interests, they drive kids from structured activity to structured activity.
The result is that parents often dread weekends and look forward to weekdays when they “only” have to do their jobs.
And of course, they never actually rest.
One thing I learned from Simplicity Parenting by Kim John Payne is that these packed schedules aren’t even good for the kids themselves!
So, I cut it down to one structured class for my kid per weekend. In one season, he might do gymnastics, another soccer, and another music. But it’s always one at a time.
That allows him time to play in an unstructured and unhurried way. It allows the family to spend more quality time together. And it gives my husband and I time to do hobbies we want to do.
A simple life means more calm in your home and more time for activities that fill your cup.
3. Most of My Yearly Goals
I’ve written before about the danger of too many goals. Previously, I was an avid goal-writer. Especially at the beginning of the year, or around my birthday.
And I think it’s a positive thing to know what your goals are! My problem was being a bit too ambitious.
I couldn’t decide which goals were most important to me. Because I hadn’t done the work of getting intentional or really understanding myself.
So, I created long lists of every possible goal that sounded interesting to me. Become an advanced yoga practitioner, learn a particular language, lose a certain amount of weight, read a suitably impressive number of books.
And amidst all these low-value goals were ones that should have been major priorities: find a new job (and quit the one you hate) or do the inner work necessary to find a successful relationship. You know, things that would actually change my life in a way that learning crow pose or losing 10 pounds never would.
My life was complicated as I chased after all these completely unrelated and low-priority goals. And more importantly, I wasn’t focusing on what mattered most.
So another huge – but counterintuitive – step toward a simple life was quitting most of my goals.
4. Daily Hair Washing
Sometimes steps toward a simple life are way easier than you think.
In my 20s, uneducated about hair care – and especially care for naturally curly hair, I washed my hair every single morning.
This meant that every morning started early with a shower involving shampoo and leave-in conditioner. Then some time for air drying, followed by blow drying and then straightening.
Many women are probably cringing reading this. Because, first of all, this is terrible for your hair. Washing daily harms your hair. And using heat styling tools that often does further damage.
But more importantly for this list, the routine was a problem because it wasted about an hour every single day.
I didn’t sleep enough, and my mornings were rushed and stressful. I shudder to think back on mornings spent sweating in my steamy bathroom as a blew my hair dry then running for the train – late, of course – on an empty stomach to try to make it to work on time.
As I gained age and wisdom, I learned that a mindful morning routine is sacred. And that most beauty rituals are simply wastes of time and money.
5. Daily Cooking
For many women, daily cooking is one of the biggest barriers to a simple life.
It’s a chore we dread each day. Examining available ingredients, coming up with a recipe, cooking it, cleaning up the mess that cooking made. Only for our families to eat it in five minutes. Then we repeat the process the next day.
Like daily hair washing, this is just not a good use of time. Simple cooking is one of the most powerful habits I’ve adopted to create a simple life.
I wrote a full post on simple cooking, but the core concept is this: Batch cook 2-3 times per week and rotate a few easy recipes that you know how to make effortlessly. Each season, you can switch up the recipes to avoid getting bored.
That’s it! Life really can be that easy.
6. Grocery Shopping
I resisted ordering groceries online for a while. There was a fee involved, plus a tip for the driver. It didn’t seem like I could justify the cost.
But then I started considering the cost of my own time. To commute to the store, wander the aisles, check out, maybe pack up a car, and shlep everything home.
Or, sometimes, to make several walks to closer, more expensive stores throughout the week as I realized I needed things. (I live in an urban area, so it’s realistic but expensive and time-consuming.)
Ordering grocery delivery as significantly simplified my life for a few reasons:
- It saves time spent commuting and shopping
- It saves money, as I’m not tempted by random things I encounter in the store
- I can easily check my pantry as I put in an order, so I’m not accidentally wasting money on duplicate items
Now, grocery shopping involves about 30 minutes a week – choosing recipes for meal prep, selecting the items online, and ultimately unpacking the groceries that have been delivered.
Now, I realize that stocking up on groceries once a week is very American. But given that I live in the U.S., it makes a ton of sense for my lifestyle and helps me to maintain a simple life. Without overthinking or overspending.
7. Doing My Own Nails
This one is similar to the entry above regarding grocery shopping. Sometimes creating a simple life involves paying a professional to take care of something quicker and better than you can.
I think this will be a bit controversial, because I’ve actually seen “getting manicures” on similar lists of things minimalists quit to save money and time. They feel that doing their nails at home is the more minimalist option.
I disagree because doing these services for yourself requires so many products. You can easily end up maintaining a shelf full of various polish colors, undercoat, overcoat, cuticle cream, foot scrub, pumice stone, nail clippers, nail files, cuticle clippers, toe separators….the list goes on. And God help you if you want to use gel polish.
It made me seriously question – is it actually cheaper for me to do this at home? Is there any point in me spending time doing something poorly that a professional could do much better?
Now, I get pedicures once a month at a nearby salon. And all the nail styling paraphernalia stays at the salon – not cluttering up my bathroom shelves.
To be clear, the most minimalist option is to simply not do manicures and pedicures. (And at the moment I don’t get manicures, for example.) You certainly aren’t required!
But if it’s something you enjoy, you can create a simple life by just letting the professionals handle it.
8. Commuting
Quitting commuting has been the biggest lifestyle upgrade in my life thus far. For me, it happened by chance. My organization went remote during the pandemic and then just…sold the office and never called us back in.
Now I work remotely. I don’t waste time in traffic or dealing with public transportation delays. I start and end my workdays in a good mood instead of fighting for my life against the crowds of people in suits and heels flooding the subway.
This also saves me around 1.5-2 hours per workday. And I can use that for things I actually want to be doing.
If it’s at all possible for you to work remotely – making the change can be a huge step towards a simple life.
My one disclaimer here is I also recommend that you consider your working style and personality type before making this decision. For introverts, this is an easy choice. But for those who work better in group environments and who enjoy interactions with coworkers, this could end up being a lifestyle downgrade.
9. Organizing Clutter
One of the most positive effects of decluttering you’ll hear minimalists reference often is the vastly reduced cleaning time.
When your home is cluttered, you tend to spend time every single day “tidying up.” Then weekly, cleaning takes forever as you painstakingly move things off counters, shelves, and the floor, to clean under them. Only to put them back again.
I’m an organized person, and when I used to hoard clutter, I also felt the need to organize it. Every few months, I’d get frustrated with my overstuffed closet. But instead of getting rid of the junk, I’d spend a whole weekend pulling things out, putting them in piles, then arranging them all over again. And this also went for kitchen cabinets, dressers, media cabinets, and so on.
Please believe me when I say that regularly organizing clutter is no way to spend your life.
You can solve your organization woes once and for all and create a simple life for good by ditching the junk you’ve been accumulating.
10. Watching TV
Like quitting commuting, this is a change that happened to me a bit by accident. I didn’t consciously choose not to watch TV. Or even take TVs out of my home.
As my family grew and I started new projects, I simply ran out of time to binge watch shows. In fact, I noticed that when I did watch, I was actually bored and simultaneously scrolled through my phone the whole time.
I don’t think anyone will disagree that this is not an ideal use of anyone’s time.
Now I tend to spend any free time I have reading books that improve my life, cooking delicious healthy food, playing with my kid, talking to my partner, meeting up with friends, exercising, or writing. Or even sleeping 8 hours a night (if you can imagine!).
And on top of that, my mind is calmer not passively consuming so much content.
Now, I think one of the reasons we flop on the couch to watch TV and scroll after a workday is that we’re completely drained. And just quitting TV isn’t going to solve that problem. It will be a longer-term life project. But creating a simple life using tools like essentialism and intentional living is so worth it.
11. Social Media
The many downsides of social media get brought up a lot. And yet, despite what we know, on average people are using social media for over two hours every single day worldwide.
Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism pointed out to me why that is. Social media apps are engineered to be addictive. You’re not stuck in a scrolling loop because you lack discipline. It’s because you have a human brain, and companies that design these apps know how to manipulate it.
In the book, Newport offers the option to delete social media apps from your phone only. You can keep your accounts, but log in using a computer browser to check them. As it turns out, almost all the addictive features of these apps exist only in mobile format.
For myself, I didn’t even have to go that far. I simply buried the apps that tended to waste my time into a folder on my phone. Even the extra step of finding the app is enough to deter me from mindlessly turning to it during slow moments or periods of exhaustion.
Quitting your phone addiction is one of the biggest steps you can take towards a simple life. And shockingly it’s not nearly as hard as you might think.
12. Overpacking for Travel
I’ve written a few pieces on this blog about how to pack simply. That’s because I’ve loved travel my whole adult life. But for about a decade, I was a chronic overpacker.
Although I loved traveling, I dreaded the leadup to it. Making a packing list, shopping for things I decided I somehow needed on the trip even though I never use them at home, shoving things into a too-small suitcase, weighing the suitcase, painstakingly deciding what to take out when it was inevitably overweight. And then of course actually hauling my too-heavy suitcases through airports, bus stations, and hostels throughout the world.
Learning to pack minimally was a huge step towards a simple life for me. And I’m so glad I did it around the time that I started having kids – and packing for them, too.
Now, I can look forward to a trip without overthinking, overspending, and wasting time in the days leading up to it.
13. Shopping for Gifts (Mostly)
Anyone else with people-pleasing tendences will understand what I mean when I say that buying people gifts used to be stressful.
In fact, I had a spreadsheet I used each Christmastime to link to ideas for various loved ones’ gifts and their prices. I overthought everything trying to find the perfect gift each individual.
But each year, it got harder. The problem nowadays seems to be that little indulgences are simply too easy to come by. If there was a product that someone I knew would like that was under $50, they simply bought it for themselves. Sure, maybe it was on credit, or not the best financial decision. But it was extremely common.
No one seemed to really need or want anything – except things that would be way too expensive for me to gift.
I think we should respond to our new reality by deemphasizing the importance of physical gifts. If you’re wondering how to do that, I wrote a guide.
Now, I suggest spending quality time instead of exchanging gifts on birthdays, anniversaries, and winter holidays. And almost everyone in my life has been relieved to embrace that tradition.
The reason I say I “mostly” gave up shopping for gifts is that some people just really love gifts! And that’s fine – I can accommodate that for one or two people. But you might be surprised that most of your friends and family would be happy to have dinner or go to a concert with you in lieu of receiving more clutter in the form of candles and notebooks.
My life is much simpler without the spreadsheet and the overthinking that went with it.
14. Shopping in General
As I started to embrace a minimalist lifestyle, I didn’t just stop shopping for gifts. I gradually stopped shopping altogether.
When you start examining your behavior, you might be surprised to notice how much time you spend just…looking for things to want.
That used to mean heading to the mall and walking around. (And at least that was often a social activity!) Nowadays, you can do this anytime, anywhere (and all alone) from your phone.
Stores and brands will email you about sales, and you can spend hours just scrolling through to see if there’s anything you might want.
Obviously, this results in wasted money, as you’re very likely to buy something you don’t actually need. But it also wastes so much time.
These days, if I need something, I buy it online or go out specifically for that item. I don’t go grab an iced coffee and wander the aisles of Target for entertainment.
And that means it’s easy to keep up my minimalist home and lifestyle. I’ve simply eliminated the temptation to constantly consume.
15. Clothes that Aren’t Comfortable
Ok, this will probably resonate more with women in their 30s and older than with younger ones. In my 20s, I was willing to be uncomfortable in order to look “better.”
These days? I don’t have time for wardrobe pieces that aren’t completely comfortable to wear all day.
If you decide to go the minimalist route and create a capsule wardrobe – and I recommend that you do! – one of the best criteria you can keep for what makes it into your curated collection is comfort.
Once you realize that you don’t have to wear tight belts, bras with wires, fabrics that make you sweat, or shoes that pinch your feet, a simple life can truly begin.
16. Staying Up Late
I used to be the queen of “revenge bedtime procrastination.” Because I spent so many hours of my day doing things I frankly did not want to do – commuting, working a job I didn’t like, doing gym exercises I hated, and even attending social events that didn’t interest me – I stayed up late at night to allow myself some “me time.”
Of course, the only person this “revenge procrastination” hurt was myself. I was exhausted all the time, I gained weight easily, and I got sick way too often.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that, with each of these activities, I had a choice. I didn’t have to do all these things I didn’t enjoy.
That’s where intentional living can really help. I was busy all day because I didn’t know how to prioritize what really mattered to me.
Now that I have those priorities in mind, it’s easy to say no to things that aren’t important. And that leaves plenty of time for me to do what I love and get enough sleep.
17. Carrying a Purse
A purse used to seem like a non-negotiable accessory to me. I couldn’t leave the house without all my stuff, after all. What would I do without a full wallet, lip gloss, concealer, gum, headphones, tampons, a mini hairbrush, 40 hair ties, Tylenol, a granola bar, and a bottle of water?
Over time, this purse-carrying habit started to cause major back pain. But I kept it up until I became a minimalist.
That’s when it occurred to me that anxiety was what caused me to heft these things around everywhere I went. I was afraid I’d need something and not have it immediately at hand.
Like with my over-packing tendencies, I realized that it’s fine to not have what you need at every particular moment. Yes, I might get a headache and have to wait to get home to treat it. I might get hungry and have to wait for a snack, or get bored and not have headphones to listen a podcast.
And it’s fine! I survive it all the time.
Now, I wear pants with pockets whenever possible. I carry my phone (with Apple Pay) and a housekey. Maybe my driver’s license if I’m driving somewhere.
If pockets aren’t available (as is sadly the case with so many women’s clothes), I carry a small wristlet.
My life is so much simpler without having to pack and carry a 5 lb. bag with me everywhere I go.
18. Saving Gifts Forever
As I’ve mentioned before, one of the very common reasons we all keep things we don’t want or need is that they were originally gifts.
I’m positive that if you look around the room you’re in right now, you’ll spot at least one thing that was gifted to you that you frankly don’t even like.
But it was a gift! It would be inconceivably rude and ungrateful to regift, donate, or – heaven forbid – throw it away, right?
Well, I’m here to tell you it’s not. And to give you permission to declutter things that others gave you.
You can absolutely acknowledge the thought behind a gift and truly appreciate that your loved one thought of you when they bought it. And still declutter the item itself.
Then, be clear to friends and family about what you actually want to avoid the situation in the future.
A huge step toward creating a simple life, for me, was embracing minimalism. And I never could have done it if I hung on to every unwanted item anyone had ever given me.
19. Variety in my Wardrobe
Like many people, I used to have a closet stuffed to the brim with cheap, low-quality fast fashion. A lot of which I didn’t particularly love for whatever reason (not flattering, not comfortable, etc.).
One of the reasons I kept all those pieces was out of a concern for variety.
Surely, I would never want to wear the same outfit to work two Mondays in a row. Or the same dress to a friend’s birthday party that I wore to a picnic two months ago. What if I took photos in the same outfit at two different events? The horror!
After curating a minimalist capsule wardrobe, I realized that I can just decide not to care about variety. In fact, some minimalists adopt a “personal uniform” and wear pretty much the same thing every single day.
As it turns out, no one is particularly concerned with what you wear or how often you wear it. And if they are superficial enough to comment, you can safely disregard their opinion.
Accepting that you can wear your favorite clothes over and over as many times as you wish is one of the most freeing aspects of a simple life.
20. A Complicated Morning Routine
My morning routine used to be something I absolutely dreaded. In fact, I often stayed in bed too late because it was so daunting to imagine starting the process.
The steps in my routine all had great thoughts behind them. There was exercise, stretching, making a healthy breakfast, skincare, haircare. At times, I would even attempt meditation or reading.
Individually, these are all good things to do, at least in theory. But added together they created a nightmare of rushed mornings and panic as I ran to work late.
A simple, mindful morning routine helped me create a simple life. I’m so much more relaxed now that my routine involves just a couple of mindful, healthy activities. And lots of space for me to slowly wake up and set intentions for the day.
And lo and behold, it turns out I can be an early riser when I’m not dreading the morning.
What Do You Think?
Have you given up any “normal” things to curate a simple life? Are there any on this list you would never give up? I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
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