Cut the stress, simplify your life

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I wanted to live deep and suck all the marrow of life. -- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

OK, it's unlikely you're going to do like Thoreau did and move to the woods. You probably don't even have time for a walk in the woods. If that's the case though, that may very well mean that it's time to simplify your life. In doing so you may just save your health -- and your sanity (not to mention actually having time to take that walk).

Erin Bocherer and her husband are doing just that. "Our New Year's resolution was to simplify our life as much as possible to reduce stress", says Bocherer, an advertising account supervisor.

This is what the Bocherers have been doing:

• Online banking. "This limits post office drop-offs and reduces the time and money spent on stamps and licking envelopes", says Bocherer. "It also enables me to schedule automatic payments each month, which saves several hours of our time because we no longer need to write out bills and balance the cheque book".
• Hiring a cleaning service every three weeks. "We still clean, but they handle the nitty-gritty, time-consuming activities that seemed to fill our weekends", says Bocherer.
• Hiring a nanny. Yes, this is expensive, but it saves the Bocherers two hours a day in the car dropping off and picking up their son at daycare. "It enables me to spend more quality time with my son (and with my daughter when she is born in May)", says Bocherer.
• Reducing debt. "Debt is one of our biggest stresses that never seems to end", says Bocherer. By creating a strict, yet manageable budget, and focusing on paying off their debt, the Bocherers say they are creating a feeling of accomplishment.

Simplicity movement taking hold

Simplifying your life doesn't necessarily mean doing without things. It might, but it doesn't have to. Rather the prevailing philosophy of today's voluntary simplicity movement is not to live without possessions or to live in frugality, but to slow down and live a more balanced, deliberate and thoughtful life. As research increasingly shows, it's a healthier life as well.

It's no longer news that stress can take its toll on both your physical and mental health. Numerous studies have shown a link between stress and high blood pressure. In one such study for example scientists at the University of California at Irvine reported in 1998 in the Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine that men with highly stressful jobs had systolic and diastolic blood pressure readings that were approximately 10 points higher than those with less stressful jobs.

In a study published in 2000 in the journal Social Science & Medicine, US researchers found that people with a high ratio of credit card debt to income were in worse physical health than those with less debt.