When we decided to quit our jobs and move from Indianapolis, Indiana to Portland, Oregon neither of us knew a soul in Portland, we didn't have jobs lined up, we didn't have a place to live - it was a complete leap of faith. What we DID know was we didn't want to take a lot of stuff with us.

Once a day, choose one area of your home to quickly scan. In this sweep, you can swiftly make decisions about what to set back in its place, what you might not use and just haven't gotten rid of yet, what is past its prime, and so on.

When visiting my family in Minnesota in November, my mom presented me with a box full of my papers from grade school that she didn't want to keep at her house any longer. Vowing to go through the box soon, I brought it back with me to Atlanta and promptly hoisted it onto the highest shelf in my closet. "Soon" turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months.

I try to meditate nearly every day, even if I only have five minutes to do so. I choose to meditate in the morning because I find it sets the tone for the entire day, but occasionally I will also meditate before bedtime.

When we made the decision to move across the country the first of two times, we were living in a 530-square-foot apartment, so downsizing wasn't too terribly overwhelming. Limited space = limited stuff.

A few reasons to choose to live with less…

The junk drawer – most of us have one. Chances are, this is where stray items land and promptly disappear amongst all of the other stray items. A junk drawer Bermuda triangle of sorts.