Our lives can be frittered away on the non-essential.
Too much indiscriminate TV watching.
Too much time gossiping.
Too much time checking our many inboxes.
Too much time absorbed in the online world and social media.
Each of these carries their own cost. A cost to our available time. A cost to time that could be spent on something else instead.
What Is On Your List of Essential?
How often do you stop to ask yourself this question?
Greg Mckeown’s brilliant book, Essentialism explores this very question deeply. It also focuses in on doing the right sort of less so we can all make our highest possible contribution in life and to those around us. It’s a fabulous read, highly recommended and really challenges assumptions we may have about how things should be.
Why This Question Is So Important
Once we truly know what is on our list of essential (and it will be a smaller list than we often think) we can then identify the non-essentials.
The non-essentials are the friction we could really do without. Perhaps we should do without them. Or perhaps we should radically reduce the time spent on them at the very least.
When we strip back to the essential we can experience a heightened sense of living.
We live a life where we do have time for friends and family.
A life where we can leave work on time.
A life where we make time for our passion projects.
A life where we do take that “someday” trip today.
Further Reading:
Achieve More with Less – 80/20 Living
I Don’t Have Time – A Modern Dilemma or Excuse
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You can see a recent interview I did for Arise TV’s culture show, This Day Live here where I talk a little about some of the benefits decluttering and making room for the essential have made to me.
