Motherhood is a lot of things, but boring is not one of them. As my kids get older, we get into schooling, and realize the activities that interest them, I find that my life just gets fuller and fuller. I really enjoy having a full schedule. Other than the occasional need for a week off, I truly thrive when my calendar is full and my days are packed with a life lived on purpose. There’s a big difference in being too busy and in simply having a full life. Embrace where you’re at and if you find yourself overwhelmed, find ways to simplify wherever you can.

Minimalism is one way to do this. It kept me afloat and simplified my to do list in a very chaotic, uncontrollable time of my life when babies dictated everything, all the way down to how much sleep I got. No matter how many kids you have and what season of motherhood you’re in, minimalism lifts a huge burden you may not even know you’ve been carrying. It’s such a gift and is especially helpful for the family with a full calendar.

In This Episode, Allie Discusses:

• How minimalism lifts the burdens you may not know you are carrying and makes your life less stressful.

• The ways minimalism alleviates time spent cleaning and prepares your home to always be ready to have people over.

• The benefits of minimalism for your kids. They will enjoy experiences over things more and aren’t overstimulated by all the clutter.

• When you have less, decision making is easier, you know where everything is, and you can say yes to more of what you want to do.  

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Allie’s Blog Post: 10 Ways Minimalism Helps The Very Busy On The Go Family

• Minimalism Starter Kit

• Your Uncluttered Home

• Allie’s Courses

• The Purpose Show Facebook Community

Mom life. We are surrounded with the message that it’s the tired life. The no-time-for-myself life. The hard life. And while it is hard and full of lots of servitude, the idea that motherhood means a joyless life is something I am passionate about putting a stop to. I’m on a mission to help you stop counting down the minutes till bedtime, at least most days. I want you to stop cleaning up after your kid’s childhood and start being present for it. Start enjoying it. I believe in John 10:10 “that we are called to abundant life” and I know mothers are not excluded from that promise. Join me in conversations about simplicity, minimalism and lots of other good stuff that leads to a life of less for the sake of enjoying more in your motherhood. I’m Allie Casazza and this is                   The Purpose Show.

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Hi, beautiful! Thank you for listening to my show today! I’m really glad that you’re here.

I’m super stoked about this episode. It’s something that I love talking about. We’re going to dive in to 10 ways minimalism helps the super busy family.

Motherhood is many, many things, but boring is definitely not one of them. The older my kids get, I realize that life gets busier in a different way. When they were super little and I was in the toddler/having babies phase of life, it was physically busy and I was really exhausted from that, and also emotionally drained just from dealing with them. The meltdowns, freakouts, tantrums and all that. Now it’s busy in a new way, which I think is super fun. The kids are older. They’ve got different interests. They’ve got homeschool groups to go to, activities, horse lessons, and all these things. I find that my life has just gotten fuller and fuller and busy in a new way.

I really enjoy having a full schedule. I’m definitely an introvert. I definitely get my energy from being by myself. I love being home a lot, but I don’t like doing nothing. I will usually schedule a “nothing” day, maybe once a week, maybe less, depending on what I need, but other than that I really enjoy being a busy person. I really thrive, and so does Brian, when our calendar is full and our days are packed with a life lived on purpose. That’s our sweet spot. That’s how we like to be.

In fact, if we have a day or two where we’ve been home, maybe there’s a ton of work to get done and we decide the kids are gonna just do some school, do some reading and have a couple of “techy” days while we catch up on work, or it feels like we’re just home a lot, we will find ourselves snapping at each other and needing to get out of the house. We’ll take a walk or go to the park or something like that. Just to get out of the house. Any excuse, because we just like to be out and busy and going to different things.

I think as your kids get older and you have kids that are interested in sports, activities, extra classes and things like that, your schedule will get really full fast. Unless this goes against your core values for your family for some reason, I think this is a good thing.

Kids are so much fun and motherhood is something to be celebrated in every season. I think there’s a big difference between being too busy and using your busyness as sort of a badge of honor, and just saying “yes” to everything because you’ve put your identity in being super busy and just being a “yes” man of sorts. There’s a big difference between that kind of busyness and simply just having a really full life.

So, I’ve learned to embrace where I’m at. If I find myself overwhelmed, I find ways to simplify wherever I can.

Maybe it’s just taking a break every now and then. I just came off of a few weeks off from the business completely. I just got kind of burned out and I needed a break from that. I got burned out in that part of my life. I took a break.

Also, minimalism is another way to do this, to simplify your life so that you can enjoy the fullness of it, but not the bad kind of busy where you just feel like you can’t even catch your breath and you don’t even have time to do what matters most to you.

So, I started my journey to minimalism when I was in that baby-having phase of my motherhood. I was a stay at home mom. I spent lots of time at home. I didn’t have a lot else going on. I had three kids under three at the time. And my babies were all-consuming in my life. That’s the season that I was in. Minimalism helped me in a different way than it does now. It kept me afloat and simplified my to-do list during a very chaotic, very uncontrollable time of my life when my babies dictated everything all the way down to how much sleep I got and how much time I had to put food in my mouth.

Now my baby is three and we’ve got baseball, horseback riding lessons, a business to run, meetings and media interviews every week, photoshoots and videos to make on a regular basis. Minimalism helps me in the same amount that it did back then, but just in a different way. It possibly even helps me more now.

The more I evolve as a mother, my life shifts, and we head into new seasons, the more grateful I become that I am a minimalist and that I am actively practicing that lifestyle. I think no matter how many kids you have or what season of motherhood you’re in, minimalism lifts a huge burden you may not even know you’ve been carrying until it’s off of you.

It is such a gift, truly. That’s why I’ve dedicated my life to talking about it and I think it’s especially helpful for the family that has a really full calendar. So, let’s talk about exactly how minimalism helps that kind of family.

I think first of all, you spend a lot less time cleaning…like a lot less time. Typically, I spend about 30 minutes a day maintaining my house. I’m not a neat freak. I’m actually kind of a naturally disorganized person, but I do like my house to be clean. It will bother me if it’s not picked up, you know what I mean? I don’t care if the banister has some hand smudges on it. I won’t freak out and run over like Monica Geller and start rubbing it. But I do enjoy living in a clean space.

I like having my house ready for company to drop by. I enjoy living in a clean space that feels put together. It makes me feel accomplished and that’s just the way that I am. And even so it takes me 30 minutes a day to maintain my house.

We have one day a week that we’ll clean as a family for a couple hours. Usually on Saturday mornings, sometimes not, because we’ve been going to the farmer’s market. It’s kind of shifted to be like a Friday afternoon thing, but whatever day it is, usually like 1-2 hours deep cleaning as a family. It’s been a little bit less now because I recently hired a housekeeper to help me out with that and help us foster more family time. It’s really low maintenance. We have six people living in a three-bedroom house. I think that’s really low maintenance. I’m really happy about that and I know it’s just because we don’t have a ton of stuff taking up our space and requiring us to put it back again and again.

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When you buy something, you buy it with your time. With minutes from your life. Not just with your money. Studies show us that less clutter equals less stress and more time. It is really as simple as that.

This was the founding reason that I created Your Uncluttered Home. It has become my most popular, globally-praised, decluttering course that I designed for moms who want to live their lives more than they want to clean up after it.

It is truly the A-Z of minimalism. Every room. Every area. Every nook and cranny of your house totally uncluttered. This super extensive, extremely detailed course is literally everything you need to become a minimalist momma who is able to be a lot more present for what matters most.

To learn more about the course, go to alliecasazza.com/allcourses.

This really is the short-cut version. The exact journey that I took as a mom, 5-6 years ago now, that got me to this point of an uncluttered, minimalistic motherhood where I am spending the least amount of time on my house every day.

Motherhood is just way too sweet a time to be spent struggling so hard and living in survival mode day in and day out. Our stuff is really the cause of that.

If you want to start this lifestyle, if you want to simplify your life… I believe that it all starts at home. Simplify your life.

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Number two is your house is almost always ready for people to come over. So, when another mom from the soccer team stops by to drop off your son’s forgotten knee pads, you can invite her inside without throwing a bunch of mess in the closet.

When your church asks for volunteers to host Bible study, you can raise your hand and be confident that it won’t be a panic screaming match between you and no one else who cares, as you clean up all the things the night before, every single week.

I am such a hospitable person. I am the first to offer to host things. I actually get a little panicked within myself when I’m in a situation where somebody else is the host. I love being the one to host.

We have a whole other set of cups, mugs and dishes just for hosting things like Bible Studies and parties because we love hosting things. I love feeling confident that if I have the wrong time and everybody shows up an hour early, sure, everything will be perfect, but I’m not going to be freaking out because the house is a disaster and I haven’t even had a chance to get ready yet because everything is just more minimal and simpler.

Number three, you have more time to actually enjoy the season of your family. You can be present. Imagine that. Actually being able to be all there and enjoy your family right now in the season they’re in. Not something that you’re hoping to get done one day, but right now. You’re actually there and able to enjoy it. Even if you’re in the thick of having babies and it’s a really overwhelming season of motherhood, you’re still able to enjoy and be there and that’s a really great feeling. Enough said about that one. That one just says it all.

Number four, your life is just a lot less stressful. Managing a family meal plan, running errands, you know, playing chauffeur if your kids go to school, is a full-time job on its own. These things will stress you out a whole lot less if you don’t also have a house full of junk that you are constantly picking up. Trust me.

Number five, your kids are not overstimulated. So scientific studies done all over the world have shown us over and over again that kids do not function well when they have a lot of options surrounding them. A cluttered room to come home to after a long day of school full of toys and junk they don’t even use, is just not good for them. It’s just not. Add in screen time and long school days, and no wonder they’re in terrible moods a lot of the time, right?

If you simplify their space, you’re going to see such a huge difference. They’re going to be in better moods and they’re going to start enjoying their days a lot more and you will too. This is one of the biggest benefits I’ve noticed in my kids versus other kids. It’s such a lifesaver.

Number six, your life is centered around relationships, not stuff. I don’t even think I need to explain that one. It’s huge. Your life is centered around relationships, not stuff. What a great way to live and what a great example to set for our kids, right?

Number seven, when you want to say “yes” to something, you usually can. So, what I mean by this is when you’re not bogged down by a ton of home maintenance time, you’re a lot freer to be involved in the things you want to be involved in. You can say “yes” to things more if you want to. You can volunteer more. You can spend more time with your kids. You can help your community more. You can start that blog you’ve been wanting to start. You get the picture. You’re able to just take on more. And this is a huge way that minimalism benefits the super busy family.

If you’re super busy, it’s probably because you like living that way, at least a little bit, maybe not too much busyness, but you like having a full life and you like being able to help and serve. This is huge.

I’m really protective of my time. I have a lot of rhythms and routines and I live a really minimal existence. It’s not because I’m selfish and I don’t want people taking up my time and I just want to be with my family. It’s because I want to be able to say “yes” to the things that matter. I want to be able to serve at my church. I want to be able to serve in my community. I want to be able to go with my kids to the homeless shelter and show them this is service. This is what we’re here to do, to help other people. We’re able to do all of those things because we don’t have so much home maintenance. It’s huge, you guys. This is a major benefit.

Number eight. Minimalism teaches your kids to enjoy experiences over things and that is huge when you’ve got a full life. I think we all want our kids to grow up knowing the value of living a good life of experiences versus things, but none of us wishes our kids, would grow up materialistic, right? But yet a lot of the time we’re accidentally putting them there.

Minimalism draws all attention to relationships, experiences, family, and spending time actually living life. That is so helpful when that’s what you’re doing – living Life. Going to baseball games, packing up for baseball practice, taking your daughter to soccer. You’re living life and you’re not focused on, “Oh my gosh, there’s so much to pick up when we get home. There’s so much to do.” It’s just simpler and that leads me to my next point.

Number nine, you know where everything is. Now, this isn’t perfect, but I will say it is a 100% better than it used to be for me. When you live out minimalism, there’s a lot less time spent looking for things. Every mom knows how annoying it is to desperately need to find your daughter’s other cleat and be 15 minutes late to practice because it was wrapped up in a blanket behind the sofa, right?

Less stuff means less mess, less chaos, less clutter, and more owning your space and what’s in it. Simple as that.

And lastly, number 10. Minimalism helps a super busy family because there’s less decision fatigue. Decision fatigue is a real thing and it sucks. All the little decisions like what to wear, when should I clean the bathroom? All of those little things like, “Mom, can I have cereal? Hey, can I wear these shoes today? All of those little decisions that we make minute-by-minute. They’re made a lot less overwhelming when there’s simply less stuff.

A smaller wardrobe means less choices. You weren’t wearing 80 percent of it, chances are anyway. These little tweaks like that in your home really add up to a totally different life. And I mean, trust me, I’ve seen this difference in my own life every single day. I see it in my business. In other women. This is just how it is.

Less is less fatigue. It’s less of all the bad stuff and more of all the good stuff. And what a sweet life to live, right? I think that’s the goal.

So, this has been 10 ways minimalism helps the very busy, on-the-go family. And I hope that this was really inspiring for you guys.

If you want to get started or if you want a reboot in your journey, maybe you’ve lost your way a little bit, go get the Minimalism Starter Kit. It’s a fan favorite download. It’s totally free. It’s chock full of good stuff. It’s totally free on the show notes page, allicasazza.com/shownotes/061.

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This was an episode of The Purpose Show. Did you know there is an exclusive community created solely for the purpose of continuing discussions surrounding The Purpose Show episodes? And to get you to actually take action and make positive changes on the things that you learn here? Go be a part of it. To join go to facebook.com/groups/purposefulmamas.

Thank you so much for tuning in. If you are ready to uplevel and really take action on the things I talk about on my show, and get step-by-step help from me, head to alliecasazza.com. There are free downloads, courses, classes, and ways to learn more about what the next step might look like for you and to focus on whatever you might need help with in whatever season you are in right now.  

I am always rooting for you, friend!

See ya next time!

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