A Year of Less: 5 Areas of Your Life to Let Go In

I don’t care about New Year’s resolutions since they mostly fail,¹ but I do think the new year is a good time to make some commitments… not specific resolutions like “I’m going to lose 20 lbs or save $10,000,” but more of “this year I will be intentional with what I put into my body or this year I will stick to a budget.”

It’s about habits and systems.

My commitment is: this year I will let go of more than I bring in.

We’re simplifying our life in many areas and you can too.

Here are the areas where I’m letting go…

1. Finances: Spend Less

This is a huge one and could easily be split into about 20 different things.

At a minimum, here are 5 areas to review with your money this year:

1. Accounts – Do you have any old checking or savings accounts that you don’t really monitor? That can be dangerous. It’s not a bad idea to keep your oldest account if you want to keep a good credit score, since account age is a big part of it, but for the other random accounts you have that you don’t give much time to, why not consolidate and get rid of them?
2. Credit Cards – Most people keep the first credit card they were approved for.

Take the time to do an overall review of your budget and your spending.

If you’re still not budgeting, start now and teach your kids to budget!

2. Information: Consume Less

Do you watch the news? Or scroll through the news on your phone? Do you use social media?

There’s so much information out there and a lot of it is… just the worst.

Evaluate your newsletter subscriptions. You can “smash that unsubscribe button” just as easily as you subscribed.

Try this for a month as well. Maybe cut out social media or the news… you’ll be happier.

Make this a year of consuming less information and make sure the information you consume is high quality. Swap some low-quality podcasts for audiobooks (or at least for high-quality podcasts). Swap some social media and news scrolling for ebooks and useful articles.

There’s more information out there than ever and most of it is trash.

Choose what you consume; don’t just consume whatever comes to you.

3. Commitments: Commit to Less

It’s easy to commit to less with so many people staying home right now, but if you haven’t officially committed to doing less—and you feel overwhelmed with the number of commitments you have—consider saying that magic two-letter word more often.

Schedule some time for yourself. Commit to keeping the sabbath this year.

We all overcommit all the time. I’m guilty of it because I hate saying no, but this is going to be my year of having fewer and fewer commitments.

It all comes back to being intentional with your life and that means intentionality in your time.

4. People: Reduce Your Circle

I’m not going to bombard you with the old, “you’re the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with” or “your income will be the average of the people you spend the most time with.”

Well, I guess I just did. But that does make a strong point.

We could all be a little more intentional with who we choose to spend time with.

Eliminate toxic relationships (yes, friends or family).

Here’s the thing, we all have relationships where we give and relationships where we take. We all want mentors and we strive to be mentors. There are some Godly relationships you have that may not be contributing to your life, but you’re contributing to theirs and that’s ok if you recognize that.

Be intentional with every relationship and know why you choose to keep it.

5. Stuff: Own less

Now for the one you’ve all been waiting for expecting: stuff.

It’s time to embrace minimalism in your life. The less you spend, consume, commit to, and the fewer toxic people you have in your life, the more calm, joy, and peace you’ll have. And yes, the obvious one: the less stuff you have, the freer you’ll be.

If you do commit to something, commit to owning less.

Try a minimalist challenge, spend a day decluttering, slowly declutter… whatever works for you, get rid of stuff that drags you down and doesn’t bring joy into your life.

I won’t spend much time on this one since there are all kinds of books and articles on it, but if you haven’t truly embraced the idea of owning less, let this be the year you do.

Increase: Where to Have More

As you decrease, own less, and reduce the things in your life, you’ll automatically have more of certain things, such as family time, rest, relaxation, and more time for the things that add value to your life:

• Bible
• Exercise
• Journaling
• Meditation
• Reading
• Sabbath

You need more time for yourself so you can contribute to others.

The more you reduce, the more space and margin you create. Use it wisely.

Further Book Reading

• The Minimalist Home by Joshua Becker
• The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo
• Goodbye, Things by Fumio Sasaki
• How to Be a Bad Christian by Christopher Easley
• Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport
• Digital Declutter by D.M. Elliot