By Leo Babauta A surprising number of our daily struggles stem from our attachments. Let me list a few: Overeating: There’s nothing wrong with eating, but when we eat out of the habit of comforting ourselves or not knowing when to stop, it can lead to feeling bad or having worse … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta One of the great joys of my life is living simply, and every now and then finding ways to return to simplicity. Life tends to get complicated with time, and so I find ways to simplify. I’ve done lists with 100 ways to simplify, but obviously that’s not very simple! … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta While it is easy to show up to appointments we make with other people … I’ve noticed that most people struggle with commitments they make with themselves. If you say you’re going to exercise, meditate, write, journal, work on a project … but then you don’t stick to … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta When we decide to create a new habit — exercise, healthy eating, meditation, writing — we can get excited and optimistic, and have an idea of how it will go perfectly. This is such a hopeful time! Unfortunately, reality has other plans. Our perfect idea of how our … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Feeling overwhelmed with work and personal tasks is one of the biggest problems that the people I work with are facing. It turns out, our lives can be pretty overwhelming. There’s so much to do, never enough time to do it, and who knows what we should be focusing o … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta I’ve found that nearly all of us make things harder and more complicated, by adding a mental layer of difficulty. We make simple things complicated: Overwhelm: Doing one task at a time is pretty simple, but we get overwhelmed by all the things. We think about an en … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta When we’re feeling some inner resistance to a task, we tend to put it off — check email, social media, our favorite distractions or busywork. We all do it. We often turn it into something bad: I suck for not being disciplined, I suck for not being able to focus, I’ … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta So many of us feel a scarcity of time: we feel rushed, like there’s not enough time to do everything, always behind, never feeling like we’re doing enough. This problem is called “time scarcity,” and it’s one of the most common stresses in our society. So how do we … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta The beginning of the year offers such a beautiful blank slate. A fresh beginning is something to take advantage of: we can start anew, and reinvent our lives. If you’re feeling like you’re in a bit of a rut, this is the perfect time to make the most of this year’s … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta This was quite the year of change for Zen Habits, and everyone in the world. Chaos, growth, uncertainty, tragedy, joy, meaning. It’s hard to encapsulate it in words, because it contains multitudes and contradictions, but this has been such a year of powerful change … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta For the past couple of Decembers, I’ve created a lot of spaciousness and slowness for myself. It’s a beautiful way to wind down the year and reflect on my life. The holiday season can be a rushed affair for many people, but it doesn’t have to be. I’d like to share … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta We will often start our days with the best of intentions … and then promptly get caught up in a chain of busywork, messages, opening browser tabs, checking on things, answering email … … and soon the day has gone by and we wonder what we did with the day. There’s a … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta This neverending pandemic hasn’t been the best mental health environment for many people — it has created raised levels of uncertainty, anxiety, loneliness, unhappiness, procrastination and feelings of dreariness for large numbers of people. That’s understandable, … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta I’ve been working with a large number of people who are very often exhausted, not just from sleep problems but from their daily activities. A lot of us are drained by being around other people, doing video meetings, going out in public … and so we start to avoid th … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta When we’re creating a habit — say, meditation or practicing a language — we often try to encourage ourselves by creating an unbroken streak. 100 straight days of meditation! 30 straight days of practicing Chinese! These are amazing accomplishments, and we should le … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta I have a client who has completely changed his life — it’s been a complete transformation, and it is breathtaking. One of the most powerful things he’s brought into his life is the practice of self-compassion. It changed everything, once he started bringing this in … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Generally we avoid hard tasks, putting them off while we either do easier tasks or distract ourselves. This is understandable, as a hard task might feel daunting or overwhelming, but spending our hours on urgent but easy tasks vs. difficult but important tasks is g … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta It can often feel like our lives are messy, cluttered, overwhelming, scattered. Like a house filled with clutter, our lives can feel like a huge mess. Today I’d like to share an idea for getting things in order: just as I recommend for decluttering your house, crea … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta The way we view life is usually invisible to us, and yet it is probably the most powerful thing in our lives. For example, one person might hear the words of another person and feel incredibly hurt, stressed, angry, and then it ruins their entire week … while anoth … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Much of our lives are lived on autopilot. We jump from one task to another, one message to another, one meeting to another, one browser tab to another. We react in habitual ways to other people, to situations. And we justify this as the way it should be. Nothing wr … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Most people experience their day as busy, overwhelming, scattered, rushed. There isn’t enough time to do everything. There’s pressure and stress in this way of living. Now, there’s nothing wrong with experiencing life in this way. As I said, most people do it. But … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta We often can spot complainers, when it’s other people — they’re the kind of people who always seem to be complaining, negative, stuck in victimhood. It’s harder to see it when we’re the ones who are complaining so often. And in fact, in my experience most of us are … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Last week, my brother was hit by an unimaginable tragedy: he lost his 3-month-old baby Tyler. I’m still in shock and heartbreak, coming to terms with it. My heart is broken for him, for all of our family, and for this terrible loss. I didn’t know Tyler, but as I be … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta We don’t like chaos. It is uncertainty, overwhelm, a feeling of groundlessness, being unmoored, out to sea without a compass. And it usually triggers a shut-down response in us: hide, avoid, procrastinate, try to get control, anxiety, or wanting to give up. Or not … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Lately my life has felt pretty chaotic: lots of projects, calls, and creation, along with helping loved ones with things, and preparing to move once again to a new home. Chaos can be beautiful! And I’m embracing it. But it can be hard to embrace chaos when we’re fe … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Earlier this week, Eva and I hopped on a last-minute flight to take care of some family business. We each had our lightweight backpacks and nothing else, so it was a relatively easy trip. On the flight back, I reflected on how flexible we had to be on this last-min … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta With the world in so much flux these days, many of us are noticing how difficult it can be to deal with ever-changing plans. It’s always been a challenge, but as with so many things, it’s become an in-your-face challenge these days. Some people really struggle when … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta In a quiet room, we can find stillness. And in that stillness, we can contemplate our own mind. What we often find is that the mind is very restless. It wants to take care of a thousand things, because it’s feeling some uncertainty and fear. It wants to fix problem … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Does your filing system include stacks of paper, or is your “To Be Filed” folder overflowing? If you have trouble with filing your documents, you may need to find a way to simplify your filing system to keep yourself organized. Filing is something many people have … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Often when our lives have a bunch of things going on at once, and multiple things to manage in each of those areas … it can feel really messy and scattered. This kind of feeling of messiness can cause us stress, and make us unhappy with our current situation. We mi … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta If you’re someone who tends spin out into a meltdown, rage, shutdown, or anxiety attack, things can be really difficult. A small frustration or fear can be turned into something huge, and ruin your entire day. If this is you, know that you’re not alone. This happen … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta I spend a lot of time dreaming about things — incredible adventures I want to go on, self-improvement projects, all those books I plan on reading! And there’s nothing wrong with that. Dreaming is wonderful. What I’ve noticed, though, is that sometimes I get stuck i … | Continue reading
By LEO BABAUTA Earlier this year, I started writing a beta version of my new book on training yourself to do your meaningful work … and I got 1,000 people to volunteer to be beta testers! It was a ton of fun. Then I fell off my writing, because of a number of projects that demand … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Lately I’ve been buying a lot of things: a nice watch, some cool folding knives, some tools and outdoor gear. It’s fun! But as I give in to these impulse purchases, I notice that the thrill doesn’t last that long, and it leaves me wanting more. And of course it daw … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta One of our deepest desires is for freedom: to be free of stress, anxiety, a frustrating person, a difficult situation, financial struggles, health problems, the daily grind, distractions, feeling inadequate. So many books, products and other paid solutions offer a … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta As I came back to work after a month off, I noticed myself feeling overwhelmed by the mountain of work in front of me. I felt a ton of resistance, and stress about how much work had to be done. A perfect practice ground for me! In this article, I’m going to […] | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta So I took the whole month of June off, just as I did in December — I’m standing for time off not only for myself, but as something I think is important for everyone. It wasn’t easy to take this month off. I had to make arrangements, sell it to my team […] | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta One thing I’ve learned about myself in the last year or so is how much I shut down what I want. Somehow the world taught me that what I want is not acceptable, that I should only want what seems reasonable, doable, or won’t inconvenience others. So I rarely even ac … | Continue reading
A lot of people I work with struggle to dive into their meaningful work because they get stopped up by beliefs they have about finding a purpose. I can’t find my purpose because I don’t have the time, I am not good enough, I don’t have any clarity, I’m not ready, I don’t have the … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta I have clients who really set high standards for themselves: they want to write amazing blog posts, create inspiring music, profound works of art, a thriving business that reaches hundreds of thousands of people. These are beautiful aspirations, and I love what we … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Many of us face things every day that stress us out: overwhelming number of tasks, a big meeting, a project that feels really tough, behind on paying bills, someone is upset at us, there’s a family crisis, the world feels chaotic. Can we find a way to be relaxed in … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Most of the people I know and work with want a life of meaning and purpose, not a life where we just get by … A well lived life, that feels meaningful. But this isn’t taught in schools, and most of us feel completely unsure of how to move towards this. I’m […] | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta A member of my Fearless Training Program has a full-time business that she loves, but isn’t the meaningful work she’d like to do in the world. She struggles with finding enough time for that meaningful work. Can you relate to this? The rest of our life fills up all … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta Most of us have a troubled relationship with uncertainty, often without even knowing it. Our most difficult problems often stem from uncertainty: procrastination, overwhelm, distraction, anxiety, frustration with others, beating ourselves up, trouble with forming ( … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta The tendency to put off difficult tasks that we don’t want to face is almost universal. And it turns out, the moment of starting a task is often so much harder than actually doing the task. Once we get started, there can be challenges (and we will want to switch to … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta As a husband, a father, a man … one of the things I crave most is for my loved ones to trust me. It’s something I want with my team, my readers, my coaching clients, the members of my Sea Change and Fearless Training programs. And I’ve worked hard over the years to … | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta At the end of a day of work, there can be a simple practice of wrapping things up and shutting down for the day. But so many of us feel guilty at simply stopping, and this feeling that we should be doing more … it drives some of us to keep going […] | Continue reading
By Leo Babauta One of the most common fears of anyone who is creating something, whether it’s online content or art or a new business or startup … is the fear of putting our work out there in the world. It’s a fear that has us procrastinating, researching endlessly, checking soci … | Continue reading