Cut It Out: Stop Doing Stuff That Wastes Your Time
It’s time to take an inventory of your life. Look around. What areas are overcrowded or burdensome? Take note of what you spend time on daily that doesn’t really need to be there. What can you eliminate to create room for better things? Get ready for bullet points…
• Playing on your phone (look up. there’s a great big world out there)
• Checking social media accounts (confess. it’s a shameless obsession)
• Checking email 26 times a day (not efficient at all)
• Doing too much for others (gasp! it’s possible)
• Worrying (it doesn’t solve anything, so why the heck do we dwell so much?)
• Overloading social “obligations” (emphasis on the quotation marks)
• Binge watching tv episodes (my god, it’s deep frying your brain)
None of the above are necessary. But we’re all guilty of wasting time on stuff like this. Habits that don’t serve us. I get it. We’re human. We might not have the capacity to be super productive all the time, but… there are probably a few things we could stand to make a conscious effort to spend less time doing. Spill it. What kind of nonsense is cluttering up your life?
Insert nonsense here. Go ahead, make a list. (Seriously, title it "Nonsense List.")
Now, don’t you feel silly? Now that you’ve brought awareness to what you’re wasting time on, you’ll certainly break the habits. Right? Will you? Probably not. You’ll more likely maintain the compulsions that are blindly consuming your energy for no good reason. Because that’s what you’re conditioned to do. You feel helpless; it’s too hard to form new habits. Wah wah wah. Calling your bull.
Decide right now. What are you going to moderate? Even better, what are you going to cut out?
I propose a challenge.
Cut it Out Challenge
1. Take one item from your nonsense list and moderate it.
Do you check social media too often? Limit it. Pick one social media outlet, and vow to only check it twice a day. If that scares the shit out of you, start with a finite time period. “I will only check Twitter twice a day for the next month.” Still scare the shit out of you? “I will only check Twitter five times a day for the next week.” Baby steps. The aim is to bring awareness to how you’re utilizing your time, not for you to spontaneously combust (which will obviously happen if you make too big of a commitment).
2. Take one item from your nonsense list and take a break from it.
Ditch email for a week. Ditch your phone for a day. Ditch a friend. Ditch a social commitment. Participate in lent. Whatever it takes. Cleanses are nice. Take a step back and help put your habits into perspective.
3. Take one item from your nonsense list and eliminate it.
Cut it out. It’s that simple. Stop watching trashy tv. Stop arguing. Say no. Turn automatic phone alerts off. Don’t dwell on things. Don’t text and drive (ok pick two things, because this one is mandatory). Some of these habits are harder to break than others. But they’re all possible, I promise.