The Life Manual: Tips, tricks and techniques for a stress-free home and life

INTRODUCTION

‘To change your life, you must first change your habits.’

As the old adage goes, it is harder to break a habit than a principle, and that is certainly true of the way we live. We are always busy but there is always something else that needs to be done. We multitask but don’t always finish what we are doing. It becomes a habit to stay late at the office, to say ‘yes, of course’, when we should sometimes be saying ‘no’. But why is it that our lives are so much more hectic when we have so many more benefits than our predecessors? In general, we have more opportunities than our parents, let alone our grandparents, more money, more travel options, more entertainment choices and more technology to help us.

And if that sentence doesn’t give you a clue as to what I am getting at, just read it again: more, more, more, more, more, more. Every time a technology becomes available to make things easier, we may grasp the opportunity but then we look to whatever is coming next, filling the time almost before it has opened up. We want the latest, the fastest, the most high-tech. Spurred on by peer pressure and our own enthusiasm, the result for many people seems to be that the proverbial hamster wheel just spins faster and faster.

And sooner or later, we’ll flop exhausted at the bottom and everything will grind to a halt.

Well, that’s the negative scenario – there are alternatives.

If we continue to spend our lives with our eyes on the horizon, then it’s no wonder we trip up. So the purpose of the range of diverse information in this handy little book is to help us to re-focus, to encourage us to enjoy what we do and how we live and to cut out that constant striving for something else. In some ways, we’ll look back to less complex times and values that made life simpler. But in other ways, we can embrace the technology at our fingertips. It’s not about wanting to go back to the 1950s – there was plenty wrong with life then. It is about making life good in the twenty-first century.

And that means making some changes, which may not be easy at first. Different people will want to be more or less drastic and that’s the first lesson: you don’t have to do what everyone else is doing – it is up to you to find what suits you best.

However far you want to take it, simply learning to slow down a little and live at a more manageable pace will help you to reduce stress and enjoy your life more fully. First, look at the areas of your life where you feel you need to make changes, start slowly with small adjustments that are easy to implement and just watch the benefits to your well-being.

The straightforward hints and tips in this book apply common sense to find simple solutions to common everyday issues. They are all about removing potential problems before they occur and finding the wisdom to follow a less stressful path. They can help you to:

cast off the clutter that is holding you back;

learn to appreciate the present moment;

have more respect for your environment and be mindful of its precious resources;

look after yourself and stay healthy;

re-assess what you eat and drink and understand the fundamentals of a healthy diet;

make your household chores simpler and more manageable;

cultivate and enjoy your garden;

make simple repairs around the house.

That’s a lot to get through in a small guide, so we need to apply our common sense and – to borrow a tagline from an expensive and very successful brand – just do it!

Starting with a clean slate

How to rid yourself of the clutter that’s holding you back

The idea of decluttering is not new, but its popularity has grown because it makes sense and it is effective. If you are surrounded by mess and muddle, by things you don’t really need and that are just getting in the way, it is impossible to get on with life efficiently. Imagine trying to get from one side to the other of a crowded storeroom, filled with old furniture, boxes, piles of magazines and odd-shaped items you don’t even recognize. It would not only be hard work physically – clambering over, under and around things – but tiring mentally, too – making sure you don’t trip up or break something along the way.

That’s what your clutter could be doing in your life – blocking the way to where you should be going.

One person’s treasure might be another person’s clutter. Only you can decide how drastic you want to be once you decide to declutter. If you find this whole process somewhat daunting, then start small and work gradually. If you are really up for it, hire a skip! Either way, your objective is simple: to get rid of anything that is surplus to current requirements and that doesn’t make any contribution to your life, then to make sure everything you do have is in its rightful place.

HOW IT’S DONE

It’s a good idea to give some thought to your procedure before you actually start the process of decluttering.

Have a plan

Firstly, establish a plan. Are you going to set aside a weekend or longer? Are you going to work room by room through the house? Both are sensible options. Don’t take on too much at once and end up with the entire house taken apart – that way will just increase your stress. Starting in one room and finishing that room before you go on to another is usually the best way.

Now look at each room in turn and think about the space available and how it can best be organized. What do you want to keep in each room?

You might decide to swap things round so your bedroom becomes a spare room or vice versa. Are the cupboards in the most convenient places? Are you using the cupboards and drawers sensibly? Perhaps a cupboard where you have been keeping towels is more suited to something else. Your plan is bound to change as you work through the clearing-out process but let it evolve as you go along. Before you start the next phase, you might want to look at the section on reorganizing your space (see page 12).

What stays and what goes?

Now establish a rule of thumb to help you decide what to get rid of. It might be things you haven’t looked at for 12 months or five years. You might just decide to go on your gut instinct. But only keep things that make a positive contribution to your life.

They might be useful: cutlery, bedding, cans of beans.

They might be beautiful: pictures, ornaments, jewellery.

They might make you look good: clothes, make-up.

They might bring you happy memories: photographs, gifts.

But they will all make you feel good in some way.

Be conscious of the thought that will inevitably creep into your mind that the thing you are about to discard might come in handy sometime. That ‘sometime’ is most unlikely to materialize. Do you really want it hanging around until then?

When you get to the kitchen, pay particular attention to the dates on cans and herbs and spices. You may love sage but that jar from 2012 is likely to have all the flavour of cardboard – chuck it (see also pages 89–90). If you are a kitchen-gadget fan, think about how often you use a particular gadget before you return it to the clean cupboard, never to emerge again. If it’s clutter – it’s not a keeper.

On the other hand, keep any instructions or guarantees you find and put them all together in a folder or box. Once you’ve finished, go through and chuck out the ones for the digital alarm clock you threw away five years ago and just keep those you might need.

Memories are made of this

Even if you are being drastic, be wary of completely discarding things that might be of value to someone else or provide a record of your past. Your children’s old report cards, school photos and the like can be put to one side and perhaps thinned out and sorted to give to them at a later stage as mementoes of their growing up. If you like, you could put significant photos, drawings or certificates in a scrapbook – it is much better than just chucking everything in a drawer, and it makes a great keepsake.

What to do with the clutter

Now decide what you are going to do with your clutter. It may be best to get some strong black plastic sacks for rubbish, bags of a different colour for things to go to the charity shop, and a third type of bag for things you might want to sell on Gumtree, or take to a car-boot (yard) sale. Let’s say our solutions are: keep, chuck, sell and charity. If you are going to try to sell some items, allocate a space – well out of the way, perhaps in the garage, if you have one – so you can deal with them later.

Avoid giving your clutter to someone else – unless they are absolutely sure they want it, it is likely to end up as their clutter before too long.

Get to it

Now you can get started – a room at a time. Empty the cupboards one at a time, sort through what’s in there and decide whether to keep, chuck, sell or give to charity, item by item. Once you have done that (and it will take some time), take the chuck and charity bags out of the room – better still, take them straight to the recycling facility or charity shop. Take the sell bags to your allocated space and make a date in your diary so you don’t leave them lurking there for too long.

Clean the cupboards and put everything you plan to keep back in its new place. Then move on to the next room until you have gone through the whole house.

After all that hard work, you will find you feel a great sense of relief, a clearing of the energies in your living space that will help you feel energized and positive.

DEALING WITH THE ‘SELL-IT’ BAGS

I hope you haven’t forgotten that we left some bags of clutter in the garage, which need to be dealt with swiftly. Ask yourself whether you are really going to sell this stuff. If the answer is ‘possibly’, ‘well, I should do’, ‘I might make a bit of money’, ‘when I get time’ or ‘it’s a good idea’, load them in the car right now and get them to the charity shop. They are all versions of ‘no’.

If the answer is a positive ‘yes’, then you’ll want to decide whether a car-boot (yard) sale or a ‘mail-order’ option is most suitable for you. Have a look online to see if similar items are available before you make your decision. If so, ask yourself the following questions:

Are they new or second hand?

How much are they?

What is the postage cost?

Are they fragile, demanding careful packaging?

Are they heavy?

Is it better if they are collected?

With a bit more research, you can narrow down your options once more. Anything that is not worth the effort of trying to sell, take straight to the charity shop. With anything that is worth posting on a national or local website, take a few photos and list your items straight away. Any items that will be taken to a local car-boot sale should be priced and put in a box while you book your table at the next available event. But do it now.

REORGANIZE YOUR SPACE

Your organizational plan will hopefully have been evolving while you cleared out, with the objective of creating a flow of energy through the house, and you will probably find that there are certain areas that naturally feel more relaxing, invigorating or creative. Pay attention to this in order to make the best use of the space available.

Which room?

Some people will have the option of changing the use of their rooms –