At the risk of belaboring the topic of clutter once again, I wanted to revisit my previous posts and expand on some ideas I’ve had since then. I started out talking about the way clutter keeps coming back in Revenge of the Clutter. Then I followed up with an Update on Clearing the Clutter.
Since I wrote that last post, we’ve been busy, busy, busy with work, school, family, and everything else that seems to happen these days. We’ve continued to put away a few things here and there, not always hitting our goal of emptying one box per day, but sometimes exceeding that.
One thing that I’m trying to conquer is that it’s really difficult to sustain that motivation from day to day. After working all day and fighting through 30 miles of traffic each way while answering emails and taking calls on the Blackberry, all I want to do when I get home is kick back and have a cold beer. Unfortunately, I’ll never make any progress on anything other than work if I let myself do that.
While it’s a good thing to be successful in your job, it’s also vitally important to spend time on your home life. Just as a healthy body is key to a healthy mind, a healthy home life is key to a healthy work life. Everything we do is connected in some way.
It’s important to keep motivating yourself in order to keep moving toward the goals you’ve set for yourself. I’m thinking about motivation a lot lately as there are areas in my life I’d like to improve, but I’m finding it hard to get started (like exercise!). I have a few ideas on this that I’m going to put together into a new post in the next few days.
Related posts:
First and perhaps foremost, don’t sacrifice too much sleep for progress. Staying up late into the night building the newest website, writing a couple of articles, or researching the newest trend will only ruin the next day. And, lack of sleep will affect your attitude, both at your “real” job and in your business.
Secondly, eat well. Don’t be tempted to drive through a fast food restaurant on your way home at night, just to have that extra twenty minutes time to work on your business. Take the time to prepare proper meals, both for yourself and your family (if you have one). Proper nutrition affects your overall attitude, too.
Hi James – You’re absolutely right. It’s so easy to forget about the basic important things in the pursuit of progress. Achieving that balance that allows you to make progress in all areas of your life, career, family, health, creativity, etc, is the true goal. Thanks for your insights!
I think it all comes down to balance. There really seems to be power when a life is in balance.
I thnk living a happy life is all about growing. And I agree that when you get caught up in work so much and crave the couch time, you let lots of potentially great things pass you by. My old boss put it best, he said, if you’re not growing, your dying. Life is like driving a beat up old car up a steep hill. To get up that hill, you have to keep your foot floored on the gas pedal, but once you take your foot off the pedal, you just go straight back down hill.
Well said and thanks for your comment!
So true. Work can become all consuming to the detriment of other aspects of our life. Taking a minimalist approach and reducing clutter is a great way to get more done with less.