Ever feel like the word busy keeps taking over your life?

But what if the solution isn’t about organising a to-do list or stoic scheduling?

Sometimes the best way to create more time is simply by decluttering the small things you do daily.

And, here are seven tasks worth letting go from your life.

1: Reduce Searching Times

Those small actions throughout your day add up more than you might think.

Take something like socks. If you’re spending time searching through your drawer, pairing patterns, you’re losing precious minutes daily. The solution is simple: get the same socks.

Another way to cut down on searching time is to give your keys, wallet, and small goods an address.

And get rid of things you don’t actually use,

so they don’t keep popping up when you’re trying to find what you need.

These might seem minor but they add up over time and can even be a mental drain.

2: Tame Your Email Chaos

Email overload builds up easily, especially with junk mail, but there’s a simple fix.

Set up a separate email address just for non-urgent things

like free event registrations, freebies, news and competitions.

Since most of it won’t be urgent, keep notifications off and check it once a week. Scan through quickly, pick out anything genuinely useful, then delete the rest.

It keeps your main inbox clean and tidy.

3: Fix Your Money-Saving Habits

Going to multiple shops to find the cheapest veggies or taking a lengthy detour to save a couple of pounds on transport.

Sometimes the time invested costs more than the money saved.

If you’re spending an hour to save 50p, that time might be better used elsewhere. Unless you’re meant to do the walk as exercise.

Of course, it’s important to be mindful about spending, but you also need a balance between saving money and preserving your most valuable resource: time.

You can get your money back, but you can’t get your time back, no matter what.

4: Multitasking Meal Prep

I love healthy, delicious meals but don’t enjoy complicated meal prep or spending ages in the kitchen.

A one-pot meal can be a great option. You can make nice, healthy meals with little effort like rice and beans mixed with veggies and your favourite spices.

Then just leave it to cook slowly on low heat so it can cook by itself. This way, it keeps the vitamins and nutrients and helps reduce your energy bill.

While your food cooks itself, you’re free to focus on other things.

5: Forget the Sunk Cost Fallacy

You aren’t responsible for everything you’ve paid for or started.

You can walk out of the cinema if you’re not enjoying a two-hour film.

You don’t need to read a book from start to finish. You can read it section by section, take action as you go. If it’s not for you, pass it on to someone else.

As David Allen says in Getting Things Done, focusing on what you want to achieve rather than just finishing activities is key to real productivity.

If you feel it’s not for you, it’s okay to walk away.

6: Photo Decluttering

I wanted to stop wasting my time on my phone, sorting through so many bad photos that only looked good in real life.

I no longer take photos that I wouldn’t come out good or not worse looking back on, like light shows, distant stage performances, fireworks and moon shots.

Being intentional about what you film not only saves you time, but you can…

Enjoy moments more instead of watching things through your phone screen.

7: Nobody is a Superhuman

When something’s not your thing, trying to solve it alone can take far more time than it’s worth.

Complex Excel docs or IT troubleshooting that might take you hours could be sorted in minutes by someone with the right skills.

This goes along with Stephen Covey’s “sharpening the saw” from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Getting help and using different perspectives lets you reach your goals faster.

I used to think that as long as I tried hard, I could accomplish anything on my own.

But, hard work doesn’t always pay off.

You don’t have to work so hard on everything. It’s better to embrace working with others and help each other.

Reclaim Your Time Checklist

When you remove these small time drains, you’ll be surprised how much time opens up.

The shortcut to becoming productive is actually doing less of what doesn’t serve you.

When you clear out these time wasters, you create breathing room in your schedule, making space for new opportunities to come your way!

For more visual storytelling and step-by-step guides, please check out: Minimalist Time Management Tricks That Actually Work.