Your life is too short to work on tasks you aren’t good at or don’t like. Remove unnecessary tasks and I’ll bet you’re happier AND have more money.
Recently, I was reading an article from Edmunds, Stop Changing Your Oil, where its author, Phillip Reed, contends that the vast majority of people mindlessly change their oil every 3,000 miles – and not because it’s needed. Today’s cars can drive further, sometimes twice as far, between oil changes – but because we’ve been conditioned and trained by our parents, grandparents, peers, and service mechanics for years to do so, we change it more quickly than necessary. Reed suggests that not only is this a waste of money and oil (replacing good oil before it’s ‘used up’ is bad for the environment) but it is part of a much larger ‘plot’ (my word not his) between the oil industry and consumers to up-sell and cross sell us into thousands of needless expenditures over our car’s lifetime. Interesting read, to be sure.
Stop wasting time
But this made me think: What are some other things in our lives that we should stop doing? Or maybe stop doing so frequently? I’ve written many times about my thoughts on the purpose of money; money can and should be used to provide for oneself later in life, but needlessly sacrificing pleasurable things today so that my great-great-grandkids can inherit sixty-four million dollars is ridiculous. So, in my life there are things I don’t do, not because I can’t, but because I can trade an hour of my time working in the yard for an hour prospecting for new clients or perfecting my putting stroke – both things I like doing immensely more than weeding the garden, fixing the power or mowing my grass. And I’m perfectly comfortable with that exchange.
Part of my goal when giving something up is to exchange that freed up time with something else that provides me increased marginal utility (my economic professors are smiling ear-to-ear). Notice how I didn’t say, “provides me with more money” or “more free time,” but rather increased utility. To me, that can be any number of things: spending time with family and friends, watching a great basketball game, playing golf, acquiring a new client, marketing, or maybe even just reading a good book. But, if I can eliminate something that I’m not terribly good at or like to do with something I do like to do or am good at doing – I’ve increased my utility.
Said another way, utility = happiness.
Remove the “Junk”
Eliminating things from one’s life becomes a liberating experience and frankly, it doesn’t have to be anything as big as changing a job or selling a couple kids (although the thought has crossed my mind). It can be as simple as cleaning out a closet or even organizing that dreaded kitchen junk drawer. Ask anyone who’s started selling stuff on eBay and you’ll likely find that they found the experience quite addictive – cleaning up or eliminating things from one’s life is addicting and you cannot wait to find something else to clean up. Just last week, I asked my team whether there was one particular client who we should fire – just so we’d remove that headache from our lives.
The same can be said for reducing the frequency of useless or draining activities. In the Edmund’s article, Reed doesn’t say we shouldn’t ever get our oil changed or car serviced, but rather reduce the frequency of doing those activities. Ask yourself the question: What things should you reduce? In the money/finance world that could be something like frequency of dining out or dare I even say, trading in your stock account! Maybe I’ll write an article titled: Stop Trading in Your Stock Account. Nah, that’ll never pass the review board.
Take a second, oh dearest reader, and ponder this question: What’s the one thing you could eliminate in your life right this second that would measurably increase your utility? The logical follow-up to that is: What would your life be like, if you did it…today?
Photo by: The Next Web
It sounds silly – but for me, it was sweeping the floors. We manage to track in a lot of dirt and leaves, and since our floors are all tile, I felt like I was constantly sweeping. It seriously drove me nuts. So we bought a roomba.
I still have to do some sweeping and mopping, but roomba does most of work day in and day out maintaining my sanity over the floors.
I like the car analogy. Many newer cars call for 7400 miles or more between oil changes. The thing I’m struggling with is going to other PF blogs , reading and commenting. There arent enough hours in the day to cover all the material worth reading!I’ll probably have to dial that back a bit as there are things I’m ignoring by doing this. I won’t stop, but I’ll change how much of it I’m doing!
Good post! Selling stuff…I mean junk on Ebay/Craigslist can be addicting! We’re actually going to do that once the weather gets warmer. We just have so much crap in our house that it’s crazy. I can’t think straight with all of it and hopefully we can make a little bit of money from it to boot.
I would eliminate cleaning, grocery shopping, and commuting.
I’ve cut commuting down to as low as reasonably possible, but would love to cut it down even more.
Cleaning and grocery shopping are just mundane tasks and I loathe mundane tasks. But it could cost too much to outsource them, so I’m stuck doing them myself.
The one thing that I would like to cut out of my life now is over-analyzing everything. I think about things until I am blue in the face. I could get things done and would be a lot happier if I could just make decisions quicker.
Ha! I know that feeling. Cheryl gets so frustrated with me when I analyze and overanalyze and overanalyze my overanalysis….
I over-analyze EVERYTHING! Hell, it’s taken me 15 minutes to write this comment 🙂 Another great post Joe.
Thanks, Adam. What’s funny about over-analysis is that while I hate it, it’s also probably the reason why you’re so successful. Where most people fail to analyze anything, you’re finding ways to look at little areas and find advantages.
Such important points! As we look to seriously increase our income and decrease our expenses right now to get out of the hole we’re in, we are looking at this subject with intensity. We’ve cut grocery shopping trips down, and much of our other driving trips. We’ve looked at every area in our lives to figure out a better way to utilize our time and money. Great post!
Great post! This goes right along with what I was talking about yesterday in my post about money & happiness and how the latter helps you save more money. It’s small things like this–eliminating needless activities in lieu of increased utility/happiness–that make our lives so much richer than any amount of money could.
Great points, with clear analogies. Thanks for this! Great post.
I would cut cleaning and commuting. Hmmmm, maybe I should revisit the cost of a house cleaner, if for just one time a month. As for commuting, that won’t be cut unless I move. It’s at least 30 minutes wherever I want to go, because I am just not close to school, work, or the fun activities I love. I wish bus prices were cheaper, then I would take the bus and multitask. Thanks for the thought of the day, quite inspiring to cute useless tasks out of ones life. 🙂
We hired a housecleaner and it was a lifesaver. I wouldn’t do this if you’re struggling with debt and cutting everything possible….but once we got out of debt that was our first “cost” addition. We made sure the house was cleaned on Friday, too. Now, we enter the weekend with a slate of two days AND a clean house. SO easy to attack other tasks knowing the energy drainer is out of the way.
There are 1,000 things I would outsource if I could justify it. Like you said above, if you are trying to cut things out and pay down debt (and I’ll add save money for emergencies and future purchases) hiring a housecleaner simply doesn’t make sense (unless you are side hustling so hard that you have almost no free time). I’m also fairly certain that some day I will want to hire some sort of help on the yard, but honestly this could be years down the road. I don’t have kids but I would like to spend time with them on the weekends, and who knows if htey will end up on some traveling sports team that takes up the weekends? We’ll see…basically I agree with you 100% about dumping things for higher utility.
DC, I’d always hire help just before you think you’re ready. Once you’ve done it, people who are motivated to get ahead fill in the $.50 chores with $1 tasks that earn more money. OG talks a good game about his golf swing, but he outsources to get more done.
I hate cleaning but I also hate dirt. I can’t relax if the house is dirty, but I can’t clean without feeling like I should be doing something else. I am seriously considering a cleaning service when our student loans are gone. Maybe I might get better at gardening if I didn’t have to worry about house cleaning or maybe I could just start listening to your podcasts with my spare time!
Ha! Of course, the podcast listening will make you even more money AND bring tranquility….
I love the question! I am a detail person, it comes from years of accounting. I am going to give up getting upset about trivial things. I can’t ignore the details, but I am going to try to stop letting it bother me. It is a waste of energy!
I need to do that too, KC. I get so frustrated with details out of my control. Even after reading Steven Covey and the “3 pots,” I still can’t stop worrying about “pot 3” (things I have no control over and cannot influence).
I would say social media. I ponder that now more than ever because my Facebook is becoming less and less interesting.
A good friend told me that Facebook makes you hate people you’ve known your whole life while Twitter makes you like people you’ve never met.
Cut out the junk and focus on the good, if only things in life were that simple. While they are not I am actively going out of my way to try to follow that path and it does seem to be working.
When looking at a to do list I love to get the smaller jobs done as quickly as possible and cross them off. That level of success and that level of task elimination motivates me to keep on at other tasks and not feel swamped!
Interesting approach. I always find more motivation when I get all the “automated” helpers started…like the washing machine, dish washer, etc. I also love the Laura Vanderkam advice on our podcast to handle big stuff in the morning, while you have resolve.