Less Is More, And Letting Go

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This last year of covid 19 has been weird. It’s impact extending into 2020 making working from home for me the norm.

As one of my colleagues said it has converted working from home to ‘living at work’.  He was right…

I have spent the last few months doing very long hours at work. One week it was up to 85 hours….blurring the boundaries between home and work life.

In this gap between Christmas and New Year I have time to reflect on my next steps. And think about how to explain the work that I do.

It has always had a theme about doing less with what we already have. So I guess I haven’t been walking my talk. Being pushed along by the engine of corporate projects.

Most of my work has been about watching and listening to what my clients have told me that they do, compared to what they actually do.

When I ask them if I can observe them in action, they are nervous. It is hard exposing yourself and feeling vulnerable. I get it.

When I ask them why they do things the way they do them, most don’t know the reasons. It can be that someone showed them how to do it and they picked up a pattern from that person without realizing it.

It’s not a judgment. Not at all…it is about trying to find the gap between what we think we should be doing and how we should be doing it compared with our actions.

Mostly my work involves helping clients to identify how to do less and be effective. Spending less time, energy and money but focusing on the actions that give the greatest outcomes.

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What I find interesting is that my clients hold on to doing it hard. It is difficult to let go of inefficient ways of doing things.

One of the reasons is habit and I think it is due to our subconscious fears. We are afraid to be judged and afraid to let go.

It takes courage to do things differently. There’s that gap between being comfortable in our patterns and being uncomfortable in new ways of being and doing. Carving out a new pathway in our minds to take us somewhere new.

If we can bridge the gap between the familiar and the new, we can let go of a lot of double handling and time wasting. To do this we need to let go of our current way of being and doing.

Keeping busy has a way of helping us become distracted from our vision and our goals. Doing for the sake of doing. Instead of intentional actions and letting go of what is no longer needed.

It takes belief in ourselves and it takes courage. But every time I help someone let go of inefficient ways of working it is liberating. The transformation is amazing to watch.

It is those that are willing to be a bit uncomfortable for a while that make the most progress. That liberates them. Freeing up time, energy and effort to serve more with less effort.

I can’t always predict who will be able to let go. It’s not always obvious at first.

But I can tell you this, sometimes it hurts more to hold on. Stepping into discomfort and  carving out new ways of being and doing by letting go can be challenging at first. But it is the path to  freedom, efficiency and effortless creation.

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