The World won’t end if you do LESS!

As we live, love, work and move on this spinning blue and green marble hurtling through space we can sometimes trick ourselves into believing that our own personal momentum is what keeps the world turning. Much of what we believe about our lives and the world has been shaken up in recent times in multiple ways, and this harmful belief is one thing that DEFINITELY needs to go.. I will not go into the global and local reckonings we are facing, but I would love to hazard a guess at your experience.

You wake up every day in a world where you have had to make big adjustments to survive and interact. You now have something to wear on your face that matches with your outfits but has the purpose of protecting you from over-exposure to ever-present risk of illness. You get up in the morning and think over coffee/tea/your toothbrush about all the things you have to do today and all the new ways you have to do them or new steps you have to add in. You plan your logistics before you leave the house – if you leave the house – and manually add “mask” to your automatic “keys-wallet-phone” checklist on the way out the door. Work – if you still have work – has the same requirements for your job but under different conditions. These might include work from home or hybrid, video calls instead of meetings, and putting on your mask before you get up from your desk to get a glass of water. If you have kids (God bless you!) there’s the daily or weekly Lateral-Flow-Test-Keep-Your-Face-Still-Please-I-Know-This-Sucks fight that you have to have with them and you’re constantly on call for the next time the school rings you up to say they’ve been exposed in class. There is less eating out and more cooking with less time and in some cases less money. Can you or can you not go the the gym/spa/movies/restaurant/party/concert/wedding/funeral…? How many times do you need to stick something in your nose? Did the kids pack their masks? Why are you always waking up at 3 a.m.? What will you have to adjust even more when the Government mandates change for the fortyeleventeenth time? When will there ever be time to exercise or meditate? What if things get worse with another strain? Are your parents safe? Is your grandmother at risk from her caregiver? Did you take the meat out to defrost before leaving home?

STOP

Listen to yourself, my dear human friend. Your thoughts, keeping pace with my writing. Your head nodding as I put your inner world on loudspeaker. Is this who you are committed to being? The dynamo that keeps the world spinning (but really doesn’t)?

It is no wonder to me that the great rejection of New Years Resolutions is happening. There is no space on your plate for MORE stuff to have to think about, do, adjust to, navigate, spend money one…

But what if there could be LESS?

In January 2021 my then-fiancée made me make him a promise. I was going to finish out all of my existing obligations and not take on a single thing more. I have always been a volunteer, serving in any way I can, so this was tougher than I expected. But he made the request, and I made the promise, and what a blessing this boundary has been!

What is your version of the no-more-volunteering boundary? How can you do less?

Today we are launching The Less Experiment. We will be learning how to set these boundaries, make space on purpose, and allow the wonder of life to show up. This doesn’t cost a thing, but is designed to be a community of human beings experimenting with letting go of the things we think we need to control.

See you there!

How to join The Less Experiment

Join the Facebook group of The Less Experiment. We will co-create our Less Lists together and support each other with permission to set boundaries and keeping those boundaries alive.