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Once you’ve taken the first steps, you’ll be a bit more rested and can take a few more steps:

1. Sleep more at night. If you’re not getting at least 7 hours of sleep, you’re probably getting too little. Lots of people need a full 8 hours, and some need more. Go to bed earlier — the Internet will be fine without you. I like to read before bed (a book, not websites) as a ritual that helps me sleep. It takes awhile before your sleeping patterns change. If you have insomnia, try my simple cure.

2. Take stretch breaks. We sit for too long at the computer, sapping energy. Get up, stretch, every 20-25 minutes. Walk around for a minute or five. Move in any way you can — do pushups, squats, lunges, jump up and down, do a dance. Get the blood circulating.

3. Exercise regularly. You needed me to tell you to exercise, I’m sure. But it’s amazing how even a little exercise can help you to feel more energized throughout the day. A huge workout session can leave you exhausted — in which case you should rest — but shorter workouts leave you physically just a bit tired, but mentally you feel amazing.

4. Cut back the caffeine. If you go cold turkey with caffeine, you’ll really have no energy. But cutting back a little at a time, while doing some of the things mentioned here, won’t be bad. And you’ll skip the afternoon withdrawal, which can ruin half your day. If you feel tired from drinking less caffeine, take a short nap.

5. Be less busy. Seriously, we’re too busy these days. Cut back on commitments, put space between things, allow yourself to have a slower pace. Your energy levels will thank you.

How to Get Started When You’re Too Tired to Start

My first suggestion is to take a nap. If you’re too tired to take other steps, taking a nap is easy. If you can’t take a nap, at the very least disconnect from digital devices. Computers and smartphones are powerful tools, but being on them for too long tires us out.

Disconnect, get outside, take a walk. Cancel an appointment or two if you can. Stretch. Massage your shoulders. Close your eyes for a few minutes. Breathe.

These are small things you can do right away, and they will help you become more rested.

Why We’re Tired

Mostly we’re tired because we don’t rest enough. Yeah, I know: duh, Leo. But if it’s so obvious, why do we ignore it?

The Spanish famously have siestas. When I get tired, so do I. It’s a luxury not everyone can afford, but even when I had a day job I would find ways to sneak into a back room and take a power nap of 20 minutes.

We don’t rest enough. It’s not as important as other things: waking early, getting stuff done, attending to a thousand meetings, being sucked into the world of online connections and reading, god-forsaken television.

So we cut rest in favor of these other things that are much more important, and then wonder why our energy levels are low.

But there’s more. If you’re like me, you drink coffee in the morning. You might drink more later in the morning, to keep yourself energized. By the time afternoon rolls around, you’re in caffeine withdrawal. This is often why people are sapped by mid-afternoon.

We also run ourselves too fast, like a sprint, when life is much longer than a sprint. Try it: go outside and sprint all-out for two minutes. Stop, breathe for a sec, then sprint again. See how long you can keep that up — most can’t go very long. Our days are like a series of sprints.

Note: Sometimes chronic fatigue can be a sign of deeper problems. For athletes, it’s often a sign of overtraining. For others, it could be a sign of depression or other medical issues. If it’s a continuing problem, I’d recommend getting checked out, just in case.

Tired of Being Tired

‘A man grows most tired while standing still.’ ~Chinese proverb

Post written by Leo Babauta.

It’s tough being tired all day. I’ve had days like this, when I’m struggling through the day and don’t have the energy to tackle anything that matters.

Hell, I’ve had years like this.

When you’re tired, not much seems appealing. Life is dulled, and you don’t get much accomplished. Worst, you don’t have the energy to change the situation.

These days I don’t have many days like this, but when I do, I rest. We have gotten good at ignoring our body’s signals — much of our lives is training our minds to pretend our bodies aren’t tired, so we can be more productive.

This is wrong. It ends up in burnout and less production, because we inevitably run out of energy. Listen to your body — your long-term health and sanity depend on it.

3. Let the little things go. People who struggle often fight over little things. We obsess over things that don’t really matter. We create resistance instead of letting things glide off us. Let the little things go, breathe, and move on to the important things.

4. Clean as you go. I haven’t written about this for a long time, but early in the life of Zen Habits I wrote about the habit of cleaning as you go. Instead of letting the cleaning pile up, put things away when you’re done. Wash your bowl. Wipe the counters clean as you pass them. Sweep up dirt when you notice it. By cleaning a little bit at a time, as you make messes, cleaning up becomes a breeze, and it’s never difficult. By the way, this applies to everything in life, not just cleaning.

5. Make small, gradual changes. Most people are too impatient to follow this advice — they want to do everything at once. We have so many changes to make, but we don’t want to wait a year for it all to happen. As a result, we often fail, and then feel crappy about it. Or we don’t start at all, because so many big changes is intimidating and overwhelming. I’ve learned the hard way that small changes are incredibly powerful, and they last longer. Gradual change leads to huge change, but slowly, and in a way that sticks. And it’s effortless.

6. Learn to focus on the things that matter. This is implied in the items above, but it’s so important I have to emphasize it. Swimming (or any physical activity for that matter) is best done when you do only the motions that matter, and eliminate the extraneous motions. Stop thrashing, start becoming more efficient and fluid. You do this by learning what matters, and cutting out the wasted activity.

7. Be compassionate. This makes dealing with others much more effortless. It also makes you feel better about yourself. People like you more, and you improve the lives of others. Make every dealing with another human being one where you practice compassion.

7 Little Things That Make Life Effortless

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Life can be a huge struggle, most of the time, and for years it was a struggle for me.

I’ve gradually been learning what causes that struggle, and what works in making life easier, better, smoother.

Life can feel effortless, like you’re gliding along, if you learn to swim smoothly, to glide, to stop fighting the waters of life and start using them to buoy you up.

I stopped thrashing and fighting, and started gliding and enjoying the swim.

I’ve written a new book on this topic, called The Effortless Life, which I’ve now published digitally. Some interesting things about this book:

It was written publicly, on a public Google Doc, while the world watched. That was tremendously fun — normally writing is a solitary act, but with technology I was able to make it a public act.
I allowed the world to edit it, as I wrote. That was incredibly scary, giving up control as a writer. When I was done, I had written it in a blur, as everyone edited it … and so I had no idea what changes had been made. I thought I should figure out what changes were made, and whether to keep them or not … but then I just decided to go with the wisdom of the crowd, and kept it as is.
It’s a compendium of some of the most important things I’ve been learning recently. It builds on some of the things from my previous books, The Power of Less and Focus, but takes them further.
I’m allowing readers to buy it at any price you like. Pay what you think it’s worth, and what you can afford.
Today, I thought I’d share a few things you can do now, to make life feel more effortless.

Take what you want from this list. I find these things work, but your mileage will vary.

1. Do less. This is my productivity mantra, and it’s counterintuitive. I actually don’t believe in productivity, but instead believe in doing the important things. Do less, and you’ll force yourself to choose between what’s just busywork, and what really matters. Life then becomes effortless, as you accomplish big things while being less busy.

2. Having less is lighter. Start asking yourself if you really need everything you have, or if you just have it out of fear. Start to let go of what you have, so it doesn’t own you. And then, as you have less, you feel lighter. It’s wonderful.

Now I know that less food can also be a joy. Eating simple foods, rather than fast foods or convenient foods or sweet or fatty or fried foods, can be a joy.

I’ve learned the simple pleasures of drinking a cup of unsweetened tea made from whole tea leaves. I’ve learned the deliciousness that comes from eating a single fresh fig, half a handful of berries, a few raw almonds. When you stop putting so much sugar and sauces on things, you learn their real beauty. When you stop killing animals and learn to appreciate the natural taste of plants, you feel incredible and alive.

I now skip breakfast so I can remember what it’s like to feel a little hungry — something I never did when I was fat. I eat two meals a day because it’s easier to prepare, and I like a little scarcity in my life. I eat what I want, but I find that I enjoy the simple foods more than ever now.

Fewer Choices

We think we want a lot of choices, but really we want freedom. There’s a difference, and the overwhelming number of choices in our lives these days leads to confusion, paralysis, and unhappiness.

Scarcity choices can be seen as a bad thing, but I see it as liberating. I’m not saying we should have no choices, but fewer is better.

Try narrowing down your choices, in as many ways as you dare. Watch fewer TV shows by picking just three you watch every week. Pick just one book and read that until you’re done. Have a to-do list that’s only three items long each day. Make a weekly menu that only has two or three meals you cook in big batches, and eat those all week. You might worry that you’re making the wrong choices — you’re not. There are no wrong choices, there’s only the fear of making the wrong choices.

I find limiting my choices to be an opportunity to let go of the worries about making the wrong choices, and to focus on enjoying the choices I do make. As I’ve explored scarcity, I’ve been left with this one truth: every path I take is perfect.

We cooked at home and had better meals than ever, got healthier, enjoyed eating together.

It wasn’t all roses and cream, but there were many, many positive things that came out of this scarcity. When you are forced to cut back, you can moan, or you can find joy. We chose the path that made us happiest.

And once we were out of debt, that was one of the most liberating things ever. So we reached an amazing destination, but the journey was just as wondrous.

Reducing Clutter

Clutter is another scary thing for a lot of people. Just facing the piles of clutter in your home can be overwhelming. In truth, clutter is a mountain of procrastination … putting off decisions and fears and emotional issues and shopping addictions and more. Facing those fears and issues is too much for most of us.

I faced them, and learned that when you deal with these fears and emotions, even a little at a time, it is freeing. You feel clean and spare, not just because you’re burdened with fewer possessions, but because you’re burdened with less emotional baggage that you’re hiding in the back of your mind.

Reducing our clutter meant tough choices, it meant a lot of discussion about what we wanted and why we really need things, it meant learning a whole host of new habits.

But it also meant getting rid of things that were weighing us down, that we didn’t need but that were still costing us time and energy and mental cycles. We learned to love a spare-looking room, and the amazing feeling of sitting or lying around in a room that was clean and uncluttered.

Living with fewer possessions can be a pure joy that is unmatched by anything you can buy.

Less Food

Losing 70 lbs. has been a journey of exploring my relationship with food. In days of fatness, I ate because everyone else was eating, I ate because I was bored or stressed out and needed the comfort of food, I ate because I didn’t want to confront my health issues, I ate because it was one of the only ways I knew of finding pleasure.

The Joy of Scarcity

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Often we think of having very little as a hardship.

It’s bad to be poor, right? It’s not easy struggling with low wages, with debt, with scarcity.

And while all that is true, it’s also not true.

There can be joy in getting rid of things, in living with less, in freeing yourself of debt and possessions. It’s all in your mindset.

I grew up poor, and it wasn’t long ago that I was struggling with an income that was too low to meet my mounting bills and debt payments. One of the worst times of my life, actually.

But as I worked to eliminate my debt, I learned to live with less. And I learned that it can be a wonderful thing.

Struggle is hard, no matter how you paint it. But living in scarcity doesn’t have to be struggle. That’s completely up to you.

Reducing Debt

When my wife and kids and I began reducing our debt, more than five years ago, it was a scary time. We were overloaded with bills, over our heads in debt, and it was one of the most stressful things we’d ever faced.

So we cut back on spending, which meant learning a whole new way of living. Zap … we got rid of the cable TV, magazine subscriptions, mocha coffees, regular outings to the movie theaters and restaurants and the mall, and more. We changed our entire lives.

And yet, while we could have thought of this as sacrifice, in truth, we learned to enjoy it. We were living with less, but we were happier.

We were happier because we saw this as an opportunity to reconnect with each other, doing things that were cheap or free. We took the kids outside more, and played with them. Playing kickball and soccer and tag … these things cost nothing. We dusted off board games and decks of cards, played charades, and had a blast. We visited family and friends more.

The Zen State

When we are in relaxed mode, we notice the sensations of the wind and sun, the sounds of water and laughter, the brilliant colors of nature, the smiles around us, the grass or sand between our toes. We are feeling instead of thinking. The sensations of our bodies flow into our minds, and it makes us relaxed, happy.

We can re-learn this mode of being with practice. Do it now. You’re reading a computer or mobile device screen, so your mind is in the world of the Internet … but your body is in the physical world. If you’re sitting, your butt can feel the chair. Your back might be a bit hunched. Your fingers are on a keyboard or mouse. Is the air around you cold or warm? Are there sounds you can notice? Is your jaw clenched? Notice your breathing.

When you put your focus into physcial sensations, you are entering relaxed mode instead of thinking mode. It’s not that you’re completely relaxed, but you’re in the same state of mind as the times you are relaxed, like yoga or the beach or lazing away a Sunday in bed.

Once you learn to do this, you can do it any time. In fact, all the time.

If you’re taking a shower, feel the water running down you, soak in the temperature and the sound of running water. If you’re eating, taste every little nuance of the food, smell the food, feel the texture in your mouth, feel the movement of your hand going to your mouth.

Do this as you work, as you talk on the phone or respond to emails or walk to a meeting or drive to an appointment, noticing the sensations on your skin, the colors around you, the sounds of humanity, your breath coming in and leaving you. Do this at home, as you do chores or prepare food or clean up or get ready for work. Do this throughout your day, and you will be in a constant state of relaxation and enjoyment.

It will transform everything you do, if you do it. It will turn busy-ness into being present, harriedness into enjoyment.

Life will be lived, instead of ignored.