I made up a term for my lifestyle: Simply Rich Living. What do you think? What I mean by it is this: I use clutter-clearing, both internal and external, to maintain that balance and healthy rhythm of life we seem to have lost in this day and age. Simply Rich Living is like a secret I want to share – a real solution to so many of our superficial problems. I have looked over my past and broken down how I got to my lifestyle, Simply Rich Living, into five steps:

Step 1: De-clutter.

Step 2: Identify and Acknowledge what´s not working for you.

Step 3: Repeat.

Step 4: Non-Do.

Step 5: Meditate.

If you missed Step 1, you can catch up here.

Step Two is a biggie.  When I cleared out the excess stuff in my home, I had the willpower, clarity, and connection with my inner self to do Step 2. Identify, Acknowledge, and Hold Compassion for what´s not working for you. The first step to solving any problem is identifying what the problem is.

When you stop hiding in your clutter and overcommitted schedule, you´re exposed – to yourself.

You see who you really are more clearly. You see how amazing, and how not so amazing, you choose to be each day. And odds are, you are mostly not-so-amazing to yourself. Is that incessant self-criticizing talk working for you? Hold yourself with compassion.

De-cluttering allows you to identify, acknowledge, and hold compassion for revealing who you really are and what you’re really doing with your life!

I´m not going to tell you exactly how to identify, acknowledge, and hold compassion for yourself, because it is so individualized and rather private. At this point in reading this, I´d guess you already have had some thoughts cross your mind about how you personally do this. Perhaps it’s writing. Perhaps its that self-help book you didn´t finish and maybe it’s time to really finish it. Perhaps it happens more like in bite-size pieces throughout your day – compassionate insights about yourself that come into view. Use all this.

In Step 1 you declutter and in Step 2, you can write out what your life will be like once simplified. What will you have physical space for? What will you have time for? How will your sleep habits change? How could your relationships change?

The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over, expecting different results. It´s cyclical.  On the other hand, learning and developing as a human is spherical. Picture a spiral. Each time I declutter, whether it´s just a shelf or something as big as getting the energy-draining people out of my life, I create internal and external space to grow. Within this space is where clarity and compassion happens. It´s where the solutions or next choices I want to make reveal themselves.

This is why I made step 3 to Simply Rich Living Repeat. It is a life practice that can keep you in the zone. Tune in soon for step 3, and feel free to share below how you identify, honor, and hold compassion for life struggles. Your techniques may work great for someone else, so please share!