The law of the vital few states that roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. It’s something I have been subconsciously playing with over the last year, except I would argue that in business and in life 100% of the effects can come from 20% of the causes if we are willing to be creative.

More is just simply not always better. It requires some flexibility, opening our minds to different ways of thinking and trial and error, but it is possible to simplify our lives for maximum pleasure, joy and happiness by doing a lot less than we are taught and by investing far less of our valuable time to meaningless, mindless tasks and to work.

I have spent a large portion of my life trying to prove others wrong. All the things I was told I couldn’t do – I tried all of them. Many of them I did ‘succeed’ at, but at what cost? Often I focused on the wrong goals and sure, I made them happen, but upon achieving them I did not feel a sense of accomplishment in the same way I expected. I was instead left wondering why I had worked so damn hard for a moment of happiness instead of striving to be happy all the time.

I have been labeled a procrastinator and lazy, an over thinker, dreamer and shit disturber, not to mention messy. I fought all those labels instead of listening to what they told me. I do procrastinate on certain things, they are the things I don’t enjoy and I don’t make myself do them often anymore. I was also a perfectionist. I was scared to fail, so I didn’t even try. Now I try things, knowing they may fail and allow myself to edit as I go. I am lazy and an over thinker and dreamer in the sense that I like to spend a lot of time sitting comfortably and researching things that interest me and thinking about them and then sometimes writing about them. Thinking is hard work! The brain uses more energy than any of our other organs do. I am also definitely a shit disturber… not because I want to piss people off, just because I question everything and I think it is important for all of us to do that. I think it’s important to all of us to push our boundaries because we set so many limits on what we can do. I’m messy too. We all have a certain amount of energy and focus we can use in a day and I honestly feel like cleaning is just not that important in the grand scheme of things. I used to force myself to clean a lot, I would become obsessive about it sometimes and I realized that it was a distraction from much more important things. If I focused on cleaning, I didn’t have to focus on the chaos in my head. Next year I am hiring someone to come clean for me and I will not feel even slightly guilty about it. I would do it now, but I need to prioritize my expenses and I want to pay someone well enough that they don’t have to work very hard either and can enjoy some downtime and maybe think about an easier way to earn a living.

Before I admitted these things to myself and accepted them, I forced and tried and persevered and motivated myself and kept feeling like I was the problem and not worthy, like things weren’t working because I just wasn’t working hard enough, when I was doing nothing but working.

When I finished my equine massage training I told myself I would massage full time in the Lower Mainland, even though I heard it said by many, many people that it could not be done. It took me a very long time and so much sweat, blood and tears, but I did it. Then I realized there is no working full time in the horse world… once you get to that point, you suddenly work all the time. People were right all along, a 40 hour work week in the horse world is not really possible.

I used to love riding a few days a week, but I was sure that owning my own horse would lead to more happiness than leasing one… only to realize all the stress and responsibility that came with that and how suddenly riding became a chore, not a fun activity.

I met someone I fell in love with and loved spending a few nights a week with and I believed moving in with him would make me even happier. Soon the joy of spending time together turned into obligations of family Birthday dinners for people who didn’t even like me. I’m sure they would have preferred if I wasn’t there. Why do we force ourselves to do that? If we love someone, we shouldn’t enjoy making them squirm, but we are taught that compromising and spending lots of time together are signs of love, when they’re really signs of codependence.

In the last year I have done things differently. I fell in love with a new hobby, and while I did go back to old habits and went all out for a long time, currently I love to go dance a couple of times a week. I love the people I have met in the community, I enjoy the connection and the music and movement and I am excited to go every time… sometimes I plan to go, but if I feel too tired, I don’t force it. It would just result in crappy dances for other people and frustration for myself.

I do this with holidays too – I used to go away for two or three weeks to unwind only to realize how many expectations were placed on a big, expensive trip to have all the fun. I love getting away for an easy weekend and enjoying every moment without effort instead of trying to cram so much in.

I’m very happy in a relationship that is neither traditional nor all consuming. We both have our own, very full, rewarding, happy lives and spend time together intentionally. We don’t check in all the time to chat like many experts suggest. We don’t recount every minute of every day. We don’t do activities together for the sake of spending time together. We don’t have conversations just to fill the space between us. Without all the background noise, the conversations we do have resonate so much more.

I have made a lot of amazing friends in the last year and connected more deeply with many others. I see most of them once or twice a month, some far less frequently, because it’s more meaningful to me. There is so much value in surrounding ourselves with people who have different perspectives and views of the world than we do. Challenging ourselves isn’t having others continuously reinforce our point of view, because it is very easy to get obsessive without realizing it. That’s how I ended up with an eating disorder (not eating most foods, or orthorexia, is definitely an eating disorder), an addiction to working out, and trying to make my horse into a dressage horse, my relationship work for 12 years and working myself to a point of near breakdown and serious health issues. I definitely surrounded myself with those who told me what I thought I wanted to hear and patted myself on the back about my wise decisions and listened to the praise for sticking to my goals. Challenging oneself is being brave enough to want to hear opposing views off those with different backgrounds and experiences to see if maybe we don’t have it all figured out and keeping our egos in check. Nobody knows it all and anyone who pretends to have all the answers is full of shit. When we are open to it, we can learn from every interaction if we don’t assume people are just trying to tear us down or that we know more than they do. Maybe they just don’t want to see us struggling so hard or maybe they know we are trying to help, but think we can do it even better? We need to stop discounting life experience over lack of formal education.

I currently work at my business two days a week (down from seven). Most people told me I was insane, and likely, half the rest said it behind my back. I am excited to go to work and massage for people who truly appreciate my time and presence and it feels amazing. I do really good work in those days. I massage twelve horses a week. Driving is greatly minimized and I stick to one area on each given day. This decision was terrifying, but something I really needed to do. I was hating the amount of time I spent in my car every day. I was hating not being able to plan days off because clients expected last minute appointments. I was hating the amount of time I spent scheduling and trying to make things work for people who would cancel last minute without a second thought. It hurt to realize that my time was seen by many as less valuable than that of other professionals even though I treat everyone’s time as being equally valuable. There was a definite transition period, but two months in I realize that with the way my expenses have shifted in this last year, even with much higher living expenses, I actually have significantly more money every month even though I make less on paper. This time last year I was seriously debating investing in a $40k piece of equipment, but that is a lot more money that clients would have to spend for me just to break even and I see no proof that the new toy in question is more valuable than massage and laser. The thing with new gadgets is that we don’t really know how effective they are for a few years, and by then newer technology will be around the corner. Someone asked me recently if my decision to massage part time pissed off any clients and my honest answer was that it only pissed off those who weren’t good clients to begin with.

As far as my every day life goes, I feel far less obligated to do much of anything and invest less of my time because I value it so much. I used to go to so many things purely out of obligation. I don’t ask people for their time, unless I want to meaningfully engage with them, or unless I really need help. I offer help when someone looks like they could use it, even if it’s just letting them know that I am there to listen when they need it or sending a message of encouragement when someone is struggling or telling someone how awesome they are or taking a thank you card to someone who has gone out of their way for me. I don’t want to force people to see what I am passionate about and try to emulate it, I want them to find their own passions, and if we share some, that is amazing. It doesn’t mean I don’t share snippets on social media, but I don’t want someone to go out of their way to celebrate something for me anymore, unless they feel like it. I want my loved ones to be out doing things that set their souls on fire instead of providing me with an audience. When we feel truly loved, we don’t need proof of it. We don’t need to constantly post pics of us with our friends or partners to hear anyone say how much fun it looks like we’re having or how happy we are or how cute we are together, because we already know it’s true. Life isn’t really meant to be a spectator sport and when we are truly happy we realize we want to surround ourselves with equals we can connect with, not just fans to admire us from afar and that we truly thrive on dialogue, not giving lectures and waiting for praise. I know, it sounds crazy, but we can invest less and get far more.