Minimalism is in. Simplicity is cool. Marie Kondo did it and now many people are following suit. That’s good.

But honestly, do you even know where to start?

You’ve already sorted out old t-shirts and video games from the 90s. But what about everyday life? What can you do to make your life easier?

Good question. Let’s examine!

1. Rhythm

It can be so easy. Believe it or not, a rhythm is already the first step towards an easier day.

What exactly is a rhythm?

By rhythm, I don’t mean your hips and the way they sway to the music. I mean the way you go about your day.

How often do you go to bed at the same time?

Do you keep going to bed at different times and getting up at different times? Then don’t be surprised why you find it so difficult to structure your everyday life.

A consistent rhythm helps your biological clock.

With a constant rhythm, your body knows what’s coming. This will help you better prepare for physical and mental challenges.

You know when to go to bed. You know when you’re getting hungry. And you also know when you want to work. This not only makes everything plannable but also much easier.

With the help of a rhythm, you create the framework for a successful day.

2. Routines

What’s the name of Rhythm’s little cousin? Right, routine. Routines help you to automate certain processes.

What do you gain from this?

Time, willpower, and mental range. You don’t fight with yourself when you perform a routine.

Probably the best example of this is sports. When you start doing sports, you will first need a lot of willpower.

The weather is bad, your shoes uncomfortable, no friends are going to the gym today and you generally feel drained. There are always many excuses that you first have to actively push aside. That costs a lot of energy. That’s why it sometimes doesn’t work.

But once you’ve stuck around long enough, you won’t worry about it anymore. Sport has become an integral part of your life and routine.

This way you don’t have to waste energy and time thinking about whether you should do it or not. you make it easy

And it is precisely this “just doing it” that will ultimately make your everyday life much easier.

Pro tip: routine stacking

Routine stacking means that you combine multiple routines into a single routine. The advantage of this is that you will run your routines automatically.

You don’t waste time or energy remembering it. You just do it instead. This allows you to tick off several things at once and feel better afterward. Without wasting any energy on it.

Here’s an example:

Every lunchtime I squeeze half a lemon, take a spoonful of apple cider vinegar, and make a drink out of it. Then I drink a glass of vegetable juice and eat a piece of dark chocolate. I don’t think about it anymore. And yet I make four healthy routines into one.

3. Single-tasking

Yes, I know. Multitasking is in. Multitasking is cool. But don’t always join in with current trends, but finally, define new ones. Joking aside.

Multitasking is a fake.

There is no multitasking.

I repeat: There is no such thing as multitasking. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying or doesn’t know anything about cognition.

We humans are only able to do different things at the same time to a very limited extent. Strictly speaking, only the necessary bodily functions really take place at the same time. Anything else is a constant shifting of your attention.

Now if you try to keep doing things at the same time, you’re wasting your precious energy. Just switching back and forth between individual tasks can consume up to 28% of your working time, studies have found.

We, humans, are made to work through tasks one after the other. One after the other. So do yourself a favor: work through one thing at a time and with full concentration to get the best possible results.

4. Make to-dos for yourself

Admittedly, I was always against post-its and to-do lists. I thought they were only whipping us. That they rob the freedoms that a day brings with it.

But: to-dos are little helpers.

However, this is not the case. To-dos help you to organize your day and to cope with big tasks. The trick here is not to make too many of them.

Every night write down the three most important things for the next day and stick to them. For me, for example, it may look like this:

1. Finish document automation tutorial (my full-time job)
2. Write 2500 words for the book (my side job)
3. Write 1 Medium post (my self-promotion job)

That’s all.

If I can get this done by 11 am, great. If I still have to work on it at 9 pm, that’s okay too. When you set these small goals, you don’t just have something to work towards. In the evening you will also know what you have achieved.

5. Make fewer commitments

If you’re like me, you’re just chasing appointments all day long. You have to work, do laundry, exercise, meet up with friends, run errands, go shopping, check insurance, book travel, call family, and file applications.

The day before yesterday is best.

The more commitments you have, the more likely it is that you’ll feel useless at the end of the day. You’ll feel like you haven’t accomplished anything. This not only reduces your sleep quality. Because you’ll wake up the next day and feel like you need to do more.

You cannot win this race.

It just doesn’t work. At some point, you will stop in frustration and wonder what all this is about. But that doesn’t have to be the case. Watch your commitments from the start.

Take a look at your calendar.

How much white space do you find there? Does your calendar look like you gave a kid a paint box and left them alone for five minutes? Or does it look like a well-crafted painting that shows colors in a specific arrangement that you like?

Are you already living for the day or are you still chasing?

Now it’s up to you. With these five tips, you now have it in your own hands to simplify your life and have more of it.

Take the burden and pressure off yourself and create days that you find worth living. Simplify your life today.