How to create an amazing life in 15 minutes a day

Are you able to make a difference in your life by changing just 15 minutes each day?

We assume that something so simple and basic has little impact. The Dalai Lama said it best:

‘If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a Moskito.’

Yes you can.

How much time do you really have to spend on 15 minutes per day?

Let’s look at numbers.

Over a year, 15 minutes per day adds 91.25hrs to your life.

hmm. Can you now see that this is a powerful resource to change?

Isn’t it easier to chunk down those overwhelming goals into simple 15 minute a day action steps. If you focus on the 91.25, you’ll feel burdened by work and so give up.

You can see that focusing on this amount of time for a long time will greatly improve your life.

It’s easy to think that 15 minutes can’t impact your life, so ignore it and choose do things like hit the snooze button one more time.

It’s only 15 minutes, right?

What if you took the time to make a change and got up?

When we don’t value time, understand our values and priorities, or believe in our power to create, we turn our back on 15 minutes a day and label it so ineffective we’d rather sleep it off.

Don’t get me wrong, sleep is very important. As we have shared in this article, sleep is the most important thing that your body requires for good health and vitality.

But, you don’t have to lose 15 minutes sleep by getting up 15 minutes earlier. Turn off the TV, and go to bed 15 min earlier.

I’ve slept longer hours since I started my 15-minute-a-day of change.

Before you start with the myriad of excuses as to why you can’t get up 15 minutes earlier (I know because I’ve made them), I want you to stop and just believe you can.

I understand life’s challenges and time constraints. I’m also a mother of two energetic daughters whom I homeschool.

I started changing my life with 15  minutes a day when I also worked a job, when I was just starting my starting my travel blog buisiness, when I was pregnant, when I was sick, when I was traveling, and juggling many many balls.

It’s only 15 minutes. It’s easy to do, it will transform your life and expand the scope of your understanding of time.

I’ll be sharing several posts over the first few weeks of January to help you start (and create) your year in the most powerful way. Join our free email community so you don’t miss an update. You get lots of planning checklists, itinerary guide and insider tips.

You can make your 15 minutes per day flexible

I am going to show you how just 15 minutes per day has made a huge difference in my life. And how time expanded once I started this habit.

These guidelines are based on my current situation, but they will change as I change my lifestyle. After a break from full-time travel, I wrote this post in 2017.

We moved to the USA in 2000 with an O1 visa, which turned into a greencard. After that, we traveled extensively for almost 12 months, including a 12-month RV trip. Finally, we purchased a Raleigh home at the end 2021.

All of this is just to show you how diverse and constantly changing my life is. The ONE thing that has remained constant through all of that is my 15 minute morning routine (actually it’s about an hour now)

It’s my NON-NEOGITABLE as I know how vital it is to set up my day in the most powerful way and impact the direction of my life. I know for a fact that my morning routine has allowed me to have success and calm in life.

My 15 minute a days tasks

As you’ll see below, this doesn’t have to be just one task you do for 15 minutes a day. You can take the most important details and break it down into 15 minute blocks.

Assess the areas of your life that you would like to improve or change. To improve this area, pick one task that you can do in 15 minutes each morning.

You might start in one area. My morning routine was the most important for me. I started by doing 5 minutes of meditation. Once I was comfortable with the practice, and started to see the benefits, my practice grew.

If my life permitted, I would sometimes meditate an hour. Realistically, I can’t do that everyday. But I do 15 minutes every day. Non-negotiable.

Decide that they’re for you. I highly recommend the morning ritual! My morning routine now includes journaling, self growth and healing work, as well as reading. After realizing how beneficial it was, my 6 minutes per day grew to an hour over time.

Exercise and wellness ME Time

• I meditate for fifteen minutes, journal for fifteen minutes, do healing work, and read for ten minutes.
• I do 30 minutes of intense, strength or yoga exercise each day.
• I’ll walk or bike anywhere when I can. Choose to drive for 15 minutes instead.
• 15 minutes per day, I learn about food and nutrition.

Learning

• 15 – 30 minutes of learning each afternoon (It’s amazing how much this helps. Just this past week, I’ve learned how to organize my entire business and personal life using Asana. This will save me hours of work in future and will allow me to be more productive and efficient, which will enable me to earn more income, which will allow me to spend more time. You can see how this expansion works. It took only 15 minutes per day.
• 15 minutes of reading before bed – it’s amazing how many books you can read with just 15 minutes a day!

Creation

• You can create many different things in several 15-minute blocks per day. It’s how I’ve created all free and premium products on my site. I was overwhelmed by the time it took to complete these large projects. I decided to try it for 15 minutes per day to see what happens. Just recently, in the space of three weeks, I created several new free email courses,  and brought back to life some old ebooks with editing and simple design. If I focused on the entire time it would have taken me to do it, I wouldn’t have started.

You might be thinking, “Yeah but you have so many time to do all that.” I really don’t. I work a lot of hours a week, I homeschool my girls each day, I’m a mother, I have a busy travel and social life.

I only make a few 15-minute blocks every day. I then expand that by hyper focus, passion and efficiency. One I’m not great at explaining or defining.

There was no fairy that granted me this “extra time” I created it. You can.

And even if you still think you can’t, please just give it a go and see.

Here’s how to change your life in 15 minutes a day

What are your values

When you don’t understand what your values are, you live by other people’s values. That’s a chaos will steal way your motivation to get up 15 minutes earlier to create change.

Living by your values brings you joy and energy. Spend 15 minutes identifying your values. Get clear on your values and draw a picture about how your life will be if you live in accordance with them.

It’s one of the first tasks we do in my Money Cleanse, and many participants have said how much it helped them gain clarity and create change.

My values are:Freedom, security, abundance and joy are all the things that bring about growth.

It’s only recently that I realised how important security was. I didn’t pay attention to it because it felt like the opposite to freedom. The task in my Money Cleanse helped me to see that you can’t have one without the other.

I realized this and spent 15 minutes each day organizing my finances and planning to invest my money and grow it instead of being so impulsive.

I have cut down on wasteful spending, increased my savings, and this month made my first long-term investment. I also started an investment account to help my girls. It’s incredible the huge change in myself and my future because of this.

What is the most important thing you can do right now?

Is it health? Perhaps your health is in excellent shape. So are your finances? Growth? Do you desire more time for hobbies or relaxation?

If you spend 15 minutes each day improving one area of your life, how will it impact your life?

Please don’t be part of the instantaneous gratitude tribe. It doesn’t work. Change is a journey that takes time.

If you knew you could live the life you desire in three years, would it be a challenge to dedicate just 15 minutes each morning to make it happen.

Start small and grow large.

Make something new

I just finished reading Create or Hate, a book written by Dan Norris, a friend and fellow Gold Coast Entrepreneur. It’s an easy read that you can knock off quite quickly by devoting 15 minutes of an evening to read before sleeping.

I love how he presents the idea that we’re always doing one or the other.

Our inability to fulfill our natural desire to create hates us.

We give into the hate monsters (I call them fear monsters) that tell us we’re not good enough and can’t make it work (otherwise known as excuses).

When we don’t create, hate wins and we end up hating others who are creating. Jealousy, insecurity, and negativity can turn into judgments and criticism. You then feel the pressure to create something that’s better, except hate is stopping you from doing that.

Phew. Vicious cycle isn’t it?

Break the cycle. Spend 15 minutes a day creating something from your heart – perhaps you like painting, drawing, writing, acting. Don’t throw it in the I don’t have the time to bin.

These are the kinds of things that can set your soul on fire. Light up!

(Btw, why do adult coloring books seem to be flying off the shelves?)

I have created many products and content for this blog by simply writing for 15 minutes each day. This post was one of those, and I wrote a lot of it on my 15-minute daily run.

Although it can take me days, weeks or even months to make something, at least it gets done. If I don’t start because I don’t have time – the concept being I need x hours to create this thing – then it never gets done.

Instead, I say, “I’ll spend just 15 minutes a day doing this.” Some days I find flow and I write for longer and produce more.

The 15 minutes can be used as leverage. If you can’t leverage it into more, you’ll still get something created. Even if it’s at snail’s pace, it’s better than nothing.

Get up and do it

You can schedule the change in your planner. Set your alarm. Don’t hit the snooze button. Get up and get to work.

I’ve created a path of least resistance by having my workout gear sitting at the bottom of my bed, leaving no space for procrastination. I get dressed when I wake up. (I now exercise later in the day (everyday) Non negotiable

(Note – I set my alarm 15 mins before I intend to get out of bed. The alarm will sound at the time that I actually get up. I get an extra 15 minutes sleep and one snooze option.

I always thought you’d have to run for at least 30 minutes to have any serious benefit. I didn’t run for 30 minutes because it was too painful. Every morning, the hate voice in my head still haunts me until I start running. My mantra helps me silence the excuses. “It’s only 15 minutes out of your day today. You can make 15 minutes.”

I feel amazing and the 15 minutes fly by quickly.

I’ve been running just 15 minutes a day now for nearly two months. I’m much fitter and stronger. I’ve lost weight. I feel more energetic. It helps me to cope with the day. My time has increased. I’m getting way more done. I’m drinking way less alcohol (like not one glass in the past almost three weeks!!) I am eating healthier. I now exercise for 30 minutes per day, 1×2 a week. I can easily run 30 minute. You will be amazed at how much time passes!

I’m more focused. I give fewer excuses. I’m aligned with my values. I am able to build self-esteem by following through with what my promises and not living a life of hate and excuses.

Notice how the time expands

This concept was literally born when I got up five minutes earlier to meditate. It’s all I could manage. My ME time is now one hour each morning. Once I realized how beneficial it was to the quality of my life, I increased the time I had to do it. I didn’t even notice in what other aspects of my life I cut back on the time.

My focus started to shift subtly towards priorities, values, and what was enhancing rather than detracting from my life.

Belinda Davidson, my friend and mentor, recently said,

“When you work on your inner world, time expands.”

When I look at my life, it’s insanely busy, and I have a lot of things to do each day, but it feels like I have the gift of time at my hands.

I look back to the days before I started expanding my time and am amazed at how I used to think and the excuses I’d make. I really didn’t have much time then because I believed it and kept telling myself so.

I truly don’t know what I was doing with my time. Most of it was wasted on things that didn’t matter and complaining about being tired and having no time.

Complaining drains a lot of energy and essentially takes your time.

I do more with my life than ever before and yet I find more time to do things that I love and enjoy. I think it relates to my life being super focused on priorities and driven by values and spending a lot of time working on my inner world.

Turn 15 minutes into 30

Once you’ve turned 5 minutes into 10, and 10 minutes into 15, you’ll turn that into 30 minutes (and then keep going). You can then find 15 minutes in the afternoon/evening.

I used to put off doing any form of exercise in the afternoons because I was too busy. I was also too tired and too stressed, as well as too lazy.

I decided to do 10 minutes of yoga every day. Again, I didn’t think 10 minutes of yoga could really do any benefit. You can see a change in flexibility quickly with yoga. I went from barely touching my toes, to now having my palms on the floor.

My 10 minutes slowly expanded into 15 minutes and now I’m up to 30 minutes.

Now those 30 minutes seems nothing to me and I feel like I can’t have a thriving day without it. It’s because it helps me feel alive, vibrant and expansive.

Where did I spend those 30 minutes? My computer work, which often meant a lot wasted Facebook scrolling due to my tiredness. It’s fascinating to test your own illusions of time and to see how you can expand it simply by changing a few thoughts and focuses.

Slowly increase your time. Find what makes you happy and grow it. Believe me, you’ll find ways to take the time from other things that don’t help you expand.

Let me tell you a funny story.

When I first started this idea, 4:30am was the only time I had available for yoga. I was so tired (and had two small children), and so wanted to hit that snooze, but I craved change, so I’d get up and strike my poses. .

One morning, I was so tired that I was falling asleep in my warrior position. I couldn’t understand why I felt so exhausted. I realized that it was only after the yoga ended that I checked my clock. It was 1:30am! For some reason, I’d set my alarm for the wrong time.

I was ecstatic I could crawl back to bed and wake up at 5 am instead as I’d already done my routine!!

You can do yoga at night, but not if you are busy with your 15-minute activity.

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How can you increase your time and change your daily life in just 15 minutes?