While September brings many people to lamenting the end of summer, this transition marks the beginning of my favorite time of the year. Cold weather and dark days invite us to stay indoors and call within, calling our hearts. We traded in happy hours for readathons and making soup on the stove as if there was nothing else on our to-do lists. Because a peaceful life means cherishing these small and simple joys in a busy life.
I’m at my best when I have a well-organized schedule, time to devote to my hobbies, home-cooked meals, and enough sleep. Unfortunately, with the hustle and bustle of summer, this has felt impossible until recently. Frankly, I feel exhausted all the time. Solution? Reposition yourself and live a “quiet life”.
Going forward, we’ll be digging into lifestyle trends to help people on and off TikTok prioritize their peace. With the holidays right around the corner, now is the perfect time to slow down.
Featured image is from Michelle Nash’s interview with Claire Zinnecker.
What is a peaceful life?
The word has millions of views on TikTok, inspiring creators to create videos of pastoral scenes, candlelit nights at home and alone time. Like many successful projects on the platform, it is also aspirational. But there’s also a simple quality that makes it feel approachable.
Ironically, the meaning of a peaceful life depends largely on our ability to isolate ourselves from the outside world. While this lifestyle garners attention on social media, it also drives people away from our devices. This is further proof that not everything needs to be documented, and that the long-standing cliche holds truth: a quiet life means more than your follower count.
If you’ve ever come across the #quietlife trend, you’re probably also familiar with living soft and slow. The concepts are much the same: Soft living, embraced by the Nigerian creator community, prioritizes self-care and happiness and strives to minimize stress. It’s an effort to separate ourselves from who we are at work—those with over-scheduled, over-scheduled, 9-to-5 jobs belong to someone else.
Why is #quietliving trending?
The pursuit of quieter living is a natural extension of the larger cultural shift we’ve seen since the pandemic. As many of us turn to sourdough and knitting (and never look back), we’re trying to keep these slow, humble rhythms and rituals in our lives today.
6 ways to live a quiet life today
Thankfully, what all this should say is that a peaceful life doesn’t require radical change. (This doesn’t mean you have to leave the city and renovate a country farmhouse, either—although that would be ideal.) Next, find your guide to quiet living, filled with ideas and inspiration to help you slow down.
1. Leave space to rest
As a response to the hustle and bustle of culture, it’s no surprise that a key principle of quiet living is making time for rest. Trust me: I know how hard it is. But during the busiest season of my life, I learned that when I intentionally created space to rest, both my work and my personal self thrived.
It’s not just about stepping away from the computer for five minutes. In our always-on world, a truly restorative break requires a shift in mindset. There’s always more to do—and rest isn’t conditioned on a completely crossed-off to-do list. Instead, be proactive. Take your phone off during your morning walk and spend a little time reading during your lunch break. By embracing rest at every moment of the day and consistently integrating it into our daily routines, we can proactively overcome burnout before it sets in.
Some ways to change your relationship with rest include:
- Embrace an open calendar.
- Make time for small, frequent breaks.
- Be cautious and realistic about your to-do list.
- Know that you can’t pour water from an empty glass. The things that make you happy and fulfilled are just as important as your efforts to help others.
2. Organize your daily life consciously
Our daily routines keep us grounded, focused, and able to bring out our best selves. Establishing a routine takes the guesswork out of it – we know what’s coming next and can align our energy with the activities that feel most natural and intuitive.
To be clear, living a quiet life doesn’t mean you never use social media, or that you work fewer hours than others. Instead, you can incorporate daily routines into your daily routine to minimize stress and help you manage your obligations with grace.
For inspiration, use the following resources to design your own support routine:
3. Embrace the joy of small rituals
Like routines, our rituals are recurring activities. The difference, however, is how much we pay attention to these small moments throughout the day. They can last for minutes or even seconds, but they bring about the happiness, wisdom, and sense of calm we desire.
Rituals help us connect emotions to our actions, allowing us to become more deeply involved in the present moment.
To me, it’s like noticing the changes in the leaves on a morning walk. It’s the fulfillment that comes from writing down my gratitude. I’ve even experienced this feeling while lighting candles in front of my partner and I and sitting down to dinner. Rituals help us connect emotions to our actions, allowing us to be more deeply present in the present moment.
To start practicing your own rituals, read this thoughtful guide to learn how to incorporate them into your daily life. Like so many elements of a peaceful life, it’s so simple yet so transformative.
4. Establish and protect your boundaries
As social media posts depicting a life of tranquility demonstrate, much of what it means to adopt this lifestyle is to pour yourself into it—getting your wants met, prioritizing your wants, and pursuing your passions. Of course, we can only do this if we establish firm boundaries. This includes the people in your life, your job, and the media and content you consume. The more energy you expend outward, the less bandwidth you need to devote to yourself.
While setting boundaries is an important skill to practice year-round, the holidays in particular can bring about a lot of boundary-crossing behavior. Be proactive now and start communicating more clearly with your friends, family, and colleagues about what you need to feel and bring out your best self. This might look like:
- Stay away from Slack after 6 p.m. and set out-of-office messages during off-hours.
- Let your family know ahead of time that your budget will only allow you to go during Thanksgiving or Christmas.
- Express to your friend that you need a weekend to recharge, but you can’t wait to spend time together next week.
If you find boundaries difficult, accept the fact that they teach others how to treat us. Boundaries are guides that help those around us understand what we need.
5. Clean up clutter
Quiet living is not an outright rejection of capitalism, but it does mean a more cautious attitude. Here, as the saying goes The space is pure and the mind is clear It’s absolutely true. When you’re surrounded by visual clutter, it can be difficult (actually: impossible) to focus on the day’s tasks. Give yourself a weekend to reset. Marie Kondo If necessary, clean up your space and remove clothes, decorations, books, and furniture that don’t bring you joy. Next comes the most important part: being more considerate of the items you introduce into your home. By being more selective about the items and organizational tools I buy, not only do I save money, but I can appreciate everything in front of me in this moment.
But the chaos isn’t just physical. Also consider mental clutter during the cleanup process. What are the worries, fears, and anxieties swirling around in your brain? Many times, these thoughts are repeated and recycled without a solution. This is where journaling can come into play. Take time to freely write down your thoughts. Mapping out everything on the page is an effective way to solve challenges and discover paths forward that you may not have seen before.
Read more: How to start a journaling practice you can actually stick to
6. Romanticize your life
I’ve always been a fan of the enduring trend of romanticizing life, aside from a quiet life. It helps inject a little magic into the most mundane elements of our time. Romanticizing the small, quiet moments can help us see the beauty in life and document all the things worth celebrating. Get inspired by these ideas to help you build a solid foundation for this practice. I can’t wait for you to get started.
