Less Is More – Simplify Your Life

Laura showed me a video this morning that triggered something I was thinking about for a few months now.

The video was a TED-talk by Graham Hill about how less stuff could actually make you happier. You can watch it below.

What are some of the ways that you can simplify your life? How much stuff do you have stored around your house or apartment that you never use?

Getting Rid of Things

Recently I sold a lot of stuff, including my PS3 and Wii and also a lot of my books.  That was partly because I needed the money to invest in my new business. I moved some of the bookcases from the living room to my office. Because of that the living room feels larger and less cluttered. It actually makes it easier to relax. Another thing I noticed was that it’s much easier to pick a book to read if you don’t have literally more than a thousand books to choose from. Does that mean that I don’t have enough books to choose from or that I can’t find a book that I would enjoy to read. Of course not. So do I need all this stuff to make me happy. Again, of course not.

Three years ago I wrote a blog post about making room for more energy. In that post I mentioned that when you sell or throw away stuff, you make room for new things. But those new things don’t necessarily have to mean new physical objects. It could also mean that give yourself more energy, more peace, more freedom.

More Ideas

If you need more ideas about how you can simplify your life, go through some of the articles on Zen Habits. Leo Babauta shares some inspiring ideas in articles like Simple Living Manifesto: 72 Ideas to Simplify Your Life and 13 Small Things to Simplify Your Workday. Or go to Amazon.com for his book The Power of Less. You can of course buy the Kindle edition, if you don’t want to get more physical books into your house.

What do you really need to be happy? Get rid of things you do not need anymore and look for more ways to simplify your life. I’m sure it will make you feel better. You will spend less money and it can even make you some money when you sell things. And it is better for the environment. So less can definitely be more.

Take care,

Gerber