This article is part ofSELFs Rest Week, an editorial package dedicated to doing less.
(And were taking our own advice: TheSELFstaff will be OOO during this time!)
No matter your family, employment, or relationship status, modern life can be a lot.
Amrita Marino
The encouraging news is that you may not need to clear your schedule for feel less overwhelmed.
The optimal range of discretionary time (or time spent doing whatever you want) according to the study?
Two to five hours per day.
In some cases, folks with a lot of time on their hands said they feltlesssatisfied with their lives.
Heres the trick: What you do in those two to five hours matters.
Within that window, happiness is about how you spend whatever time you have, Dr. Holmes tells SELF.
Here are five relatively simple ways to start working toward a life of (sufficient) leisure.
Take stock of your current free time.
Start by calculating any breaks or free time you have in a given day.
Maybe you woke up early and squeezed in a 30-minute yoga session.
At work, perhaps you took a 15-minute walk for coffee with an office buddy.
And its worth noting the minutes dont need to be perfect to count.
Was your 15-minute walk interrupted by a phone call from your demanding boss?
That doesnt mean you shouldnt count the time if you enjoyed it overall.
2. attempt to cut the fluff.
If your discretionary time typically falls short of two hours, Dr. Holmes suggests hunting for waste.
Unfortunately,work and commutingtake up a big chunk of time for a lot of people.
(Here are more of her tips for aless depleting workweek).
With everything else, she recommends looking for what it’s possible for you to cull.
It will also free up actual minutes.
For all the blech activities youmustget done, Dr. Holmes recommends outsourcing wherever you’re able to.
Time is a resource that matters.
That is, people who spend money to save time are happier than those who dont.
Asking for help when you need a break is amutually beneficialway to reclaim some of your time for yourself.
Dont have anyone in your immediate circle who can lend a hand?
Give some time away (yes, really).
(And its also, you know, a kind thing to do.)
(Youre not a bad person if volunteering on a particularly busy weekend feels like too much!)
Schedule your highest priorities first (including do nothing time).
One reason it can be tough to do that, though, is that, according to a 2005studyDr.
Dr. Holmes strongly advises penciling in do nothing time, as well.
When you totally fill up your calendar, even with intention, it can end up wearing you out.
Dont let distraction derail you.
A well-knownstudy from 2010suggests that people arent focused on what theyre doing almost half the time.
Lets be real: Distraction isnt always a bad thing.
It allows us to muddle through challenges and still function.
But you dont want to miss half your life by pushing away the now or planning whats next.
Ifmeditationis already part of your daily (or once-in-a-while) routine, good for you.
Rely on those presence techniques to ward off distraction when it threatens to kill an otherwise fulfilling moment.
