Our most basic human goal outside of survival, is happiness. Everything we do is an attempt to enjoy our lives. A big part of happiness I think, is contentment. I’m not talking about complacency or apathy; rather, I am talking about being able to get through the day and feel peaceful about life. I am always striving to find balance to achieve contentment without becoming complacent in my life.

Contentment with continued growth is a difficult balance to strike; so much so that as soon as my life slows down and I find myself not worried or concerned about things, I have a tendency to take on a new responsibility. A new pet or hobby, is a good example. I think it’s a reaction of feeling as though since I’m not struggling, I am in danger of becoming stagnant. The thing is, I always end up with too much on my plate to devote an adequate amount of time to everything. Without boring you with the details, I can assure you, there are too many things for me to get done in an average day, and as a result, something always gets left behind. Lately it’s been the gym (sigh).

We often accumulate things in an effort to be happy. For some of us, it’s a weekly trip to the mall for new clothes, or a couple new games every month for the gamer. For others, it’s exercise classes, volunteer work, or a second job. The question is, at what point to all those things stop bringing you enjoyment, and instead make things more complicated?

A coworker said something to me yesterday that was the inspiration for this post. She said that during a recent retreat she went on, one of the speakers said that although we often try to fill our lives with things to achieve contentment, the real path to being content was to remove things from your life. It makes perfect sense doesn’t it? Removing aspects of your daily life that aren’t fulfilling you will ultimately make things simpler; in turn you will directly effect the level of complication you deal with each day. Eliminate complication and ah ha! You have contentment. It made me think about my life and how I have over complicated each day by trying to fit in more than I can handle. I would love to simplify my life by removing some of the most unpleasant things (like extra jobs I do here and there for extra money), but sometimes those things are a requirement for our current situation, so this “life purge” is sometimes easier said than done.

Maybe the trick is simplifying your life by taking the steps necessary to allow you to remove the things you want. For me, it would be changing my spending habits and resolving some debt so that I won’t have to do any of that pesky side work. In your own life, think about all of the things you do each day, and ask yourself if each one of them is fulfilling you, and bringing you joy. If it isn’t, then why is it there? How can you make some changes in your daily life to get rid of it?

I truly believe my friend’s right; in this case, less is definitely more. Identify what you don’t want in your life and get rid of it! Continue this purge process until you feel content with your life; every one of us will experience contentment at a different moment. For some of us, we might only have to release one thing, for many of us it will be more.

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