Declutter your personal life

In life, we often get so caught up in today and forget about where we want to be in our future. It is also easy to end up doing things that force us to spend time in places that we don't want to be, with people we perhaps don't even really like.

It is important to make time to take simple steps to declutter our lives and there is no better time to do this than at the start of the year.

Decluttering your life is about giving yourself permission to focus on the things that matter to you the most.

Press Pause

The first step is to put time into your diary every week that is time just for you.  This is your opportunity to spend time to reset, put the week that has been into context and press pause even if you only have 10 minutes to spare. This time should be used to do something that replenishes and nurtures you. Whether it be meditating, taking a blanket down to the park and reading a book or simply going for a walk.

Set Your Intention

Whether on a daily, weekly or monthly basis it is important to set your intended focus. This might be a change of a long-held habit, a determination to complete a task or even be the way you react emotionally in daily situations.

Evaluate Relationships

Whether it be family, friends or work colleagues it is vital to understand the impact others have on your emotional state. Not all relationships will have a positive impact and may even become draining over time. This is about being more mindful of where you are spending your time and asking yourself if you are truly spending time with the people you love who support and uplift you. It is also about recognising that sometimes the cord needs to be cut on complicated relationships, or in the case of a family being conscious of limiting the time you spend in situations that will drain you and cause you to clutter your mind with stress and anxiety.

Control Money, Don’t Let It Control You

Money is just a piece of paper that enables economic exchange. It is not something that should control you. You have the ability to rewrite your story with money and take charge. Nearly every person I meet has had a past experience with money that has caused them stress and in some cases pushed them to the point that they have just buried their head in the sand and ignored money.

It is time to recognise that money is something that needs to be nurtured, and uncluttered. Give yourself a task every week that will help you build a better relationship with money. It could be as simple as starting with $10 of savings in week one that then grows by $10 every week, or picking one item in the house you no longer need and selling it.

Create Structure

New habits are hard to create, but old ones are even harder to get rid of. To support you in focusing on what matters most and declutter the things that distract you create a structure.

For me, this is having reminders in my phone that pop up reminding me of my intention for the week. Having a dedicated time in my diary every week so I can create a routine around pressing pause and setting my weekly money task. I also print reminders of my intention and stick reminders in the places I know I might fail. It could be as simple as sticking a reminder in your wallet with the question “Is this a want or a need?” or a photo that represents what is most important to you.