Unplugged might mean:

• Digital free evenings or part of an evening become the norm again. No e-mail, no Facebook, no screens: just conversation (even candles!) and connecting once again. We believe we can do it, we do not care that some of our friends see us as ‘odd’ for being off-line for even a whole weekend at a time. We see it as an easy and cheap way to stay sane.
  
  
• A meal cooked from scratch without any wrappers torn off: the simplest of grills with the freshest of vegetables and the easiest of clearing up. We believe it is worth the slight investment of time and perhaps some cooking utensils for a much more pleasing meal, better conversation and healthiness of food.
  
  
• Having an amazing weekend with the children without spending money. How much fun can we have without spending money? We are happy to struggle initially with our children, who keep quoting what other families are doing, as in the end they will find they are getting much more time with their parents who are themselves much more fun to be with.
  
  
• Taking the business back to its core: just two product lines brilliantly delivered consistently and without fail. We believe it is worth the transition of production lines, educating customers and re-training staff for building a business which has a sounder economic model, is more environmentally sound and is faster and more flexible to respond to market shifts.
  
  
• Spending time on what is truly important: health, a proper phone conversation with our sister … rather than just what is urgent. We know we can do it.
  
  
• No longer trying to keep up with the latest trends all the time and accepting that doing up the house will take time but it can be done to a budget, simply and mainly through second hand goods. We know we can do it.

The essence of unplugged …

What is the essence of unplugged? It is a return to a life of simplicity where we can truly enjoy what is most valuable and important to us.

Thus our relationships which have perhaps become far too complicated: as students we had loads of time to manage texting, e-mail, Twitter, Facebook, etc. etc. And it was good fun. Now as a parent it is simply not possible. We have deleted our Twitter and Facebook accounts and our mobile number is our simple, method of communication: it works and is all we need for our true friends.

Thus the children's schedule had become mind-boggling with far too many clubs. Two clubs have been cancelled and everybody is happier with that: you with less ferrying around the place, the children with some time to be and breathe. No, opportunities are not being lost, true opportunities are being valued in full.

Let's look at how we return to simplicity, with ten simple possible ‘shifts’ in approach:

Shift 1, Compass: check, balance and lighten

You are well versed in the Personal Compass: what it is, how to set it and how to balance it. There is now one final aspect to consider. As you become very conversant with your Personal Compass, as you re-set and re-balance it month on month you will start to see the synergy between each of the points and how this allows you to lighten the load. Thus the more you build a career you are enjoying, the less critical it becomes to earn lots of money to be able to pay for things to compensate for the lack of happiness in your job. The more you are able to keep your finances down to a reasonable level, the more relaxed you feel as there is less anxiety at the end of every month. The more you deliberately work on your relationships, the less you need the buzz of whole networks of adulation on Facebook. You have checked and balanced. Now you will be able to lighten.

Shift 2, Be there: now is great

Stop chasing the next experience. The next bigger experience. Enjoy the holiday in the back garden, enjoy a special birthday meal without having to go out for a meal that you cannot really afford. Simplify the children's birthday parties again as they have simply got out of hand … Buy a car that is a few years old but will allow you to invest the ‘saved money’ in your start-up plans. When at work do a great job and don't keep thinking about home. And when at home, stop worrying about work. At your daughter's netball game: be there, rather than thinking about how quickly you can get away and start clearing e-mail.

Shift 3, Less is more: add one, drop one

We live in a world of opportunity and ‘can do’. And so we grab those opportunities and we attempt to do them all. Yoga and Pilates classes, unlimited supplies of great TV box-sets to watch, career ladders to be climbed. Foreign holidays to be taken, holiday homes to be bought, clubs for our children to join. Houses to be made over, TV chefs to be followed, new aspects of social media to be on board with. Surfing and forums and on-line shopping. 24/7 news and bloggers. Tweeters to keep up with. We forever add more. But the reality is 8/8/8. You need 8 hours of work, 8 hours of fun and 8 hours of sleep: the more you add the more you can damage what is actually available to you. So here is the core strategy: add one, take one. If you add your foreign language class, perhaps best to drop your Pilates class (that doesn't stop you from doing your morning Pilates yourself). If you start the new strategy review project at work, maybe it's time to wrap the separate pricing meeting into such reviews and save some significant time.

Shift 4, Simplicity: the far side of complexity. Wisdom, not just knowledge. Depth, not superficiality

Think for yourself and stop worrying about what others think. There's a crazy treadmill it's very easy to suddenly find yourself trudging. And walking more quickly. As the busyness forces superficiality. Don't accept it. Ask tough and deep questions: what is the best education for our children? What do I want to be doing to earn a living by the time I am 45? How could we create great travel experiences for ourselves without getting into overdraft situations? Seek wisdom, not just the facts. Push for deep understanding not just a colour supplement view. But above all: think for yourself and life becomes so much easier.

Shift 5, Just say no: enough is enough. There are only so many sofas in a life-time

Accept enough. Break the addiction. Here are some addictions:

• Alcohol
  
  
• Nicotine
  
  
• Caffeine
  
  
• E-mail
  
  
• Shopping.
  
  

and there are many more of course: you must have at least one! And just as the drinker has to learn when enough is enough, and the coffee addict has to recognise that one too many espressos is causing their head to spin in a world of blistering busyness, ‘unplugging’ allows us to distinguish between fun and addiction, necessity and addiction, choice and addiction. Addiction can take us to a path where we no longer enjoy the process nor the result and soon we slip into dissatisfaction. Our brand new kitchen is already looking dated. It may be a lovely Mini Cooper but it's now the old model. Just say no.

Shift 6, Big rocks: proactive, not reactive

There is a famous story often told in time management/personal development circles (a quick Google will reveal that it now seems difficult to discover the originator). Here it is if you haven't come across it and be aware there are many variants. This is a nice simple plain ‘vanilla’ version:

A lecturer is trying to get across what she sees as a subtle point in time management and her students don't seem to be ‘getting it’, so next lecture she decides to do a demonstration and brings a large glass jar and a bucket of large ‘fist-shaped’ rocks. She holds up a rock and asks ‘how many can we get in the jar?’ There are a few suggestions: 25, 33. The lecturer says, ‘let's see …’. As it happens she gets 31 rocks in the jar. There's space between them but she's optimised the packing so that's it. No more in the jar. She asks if it is now full and given that if she added another rock it would just fall off, she hears a resounding ‘yes’ from her listeners.

‘One moment’ she suggests, and pulls out a bucket of pebbles from underneath the table. She takes several handfuls of the stones and feeds them down between the rocks: plenty go in. ‘Is it full?’ she asks. Being a smart audience they have spotted a pattern and someone asks: ‘do you have any sand?’ ‘Of course’, she replies and a few scoops of sand go in. ‘Is it full?’ she asks, finally with the sand peaking and spilling onto her demonstration table? Most of the audience agree, yes, but a couple say, ‘pour in your drinking water’, which she does.

The point is, of course, that we all have a few very important things in our life: know what they are, get them in the schedule first and notice how much can be packed around them. The unplugged mentality is to be proactive and work on what is vital and less reactive, or in other words, not to be distracted by what is trivial.

Shift 7, Stop chasing: most of what we want we have. Once we wake up

We've discussed a couple of times how money is not a motivator. It's a de-motivator if we don't have enough. We've re-learnt that sometimes enough is enough. There are only so many pasta-making, bread-making and such machines that we can fit in our kitchen. This is the idea of thresholds. We need a little, but no more. So it is in nature: some salt, but no more. Some sun, but no more. So it is in our life. And once we have reached those thresholds we can turn our energy from the hunting, to the farming, to trying to get time, to enjoying them. All we need to do is wake up: so much of what we want, we desire, we seek is already available to us; just wake up and notice it.

Shift 8, the 20% we will use: Pareto in action

You may have come across the Pareto Principle at work: the 20/80 or 80/20 guide. Thus 80% of our business comes from 20% of our clients. Or 80% of our exercise benefits comes from 20% of our exercise. Ultimately Pareto reminds us that of anything we do, 20% is the key. Only 20% of our kitchen equipment do we really need, only 20% of our clothes do we wear on a day-to-day basis. Of course a worry anybody has is, ‘I agree I only use 20% of the tools I have in my workshop, but very, very occasionally I do use one of the specialist tools’. It's perhaps true, but why not hire that one when you need it? Apply this thinking to

• children's toys
  
  
• food in the cupboards
  
  
• personal clothes
  
  
• books you actually want to keep …
  
  

and you'll find there is a huge potential for simplifying, de-cluttering and unplugging more.

And in the future: anticipate. Is this something we really want? Do we need to buy it?

Shift 9, Audit: what is stopping us enjoying what we have/what are our blockers to a perfect life?

When a frustration appears, take a look at it from an unplugged point of view:

The audit is a straightforward process to return to simplicity. Kitchens get messy, bedrooms become storerooms and lives get complicated. It needn't take us long to sort that out, though.

Shift 10, Talk unplugged and introduce it to your way of being

Don't let ‘unplugged’ be something you try for a month. Make it a part of your routine and ritual. Make it part of your language. A term for simplification, returning to the essence. As in how could we ‘unplug’ our family holidays if you are feeling they have become far too expensive and starting to miss the point of what they were meant for? How could you ‘unplug’ your finances if you seem to have endless accounts all with passwords, pins and different T&C?

The irony of Maria's lifestyle did not amuse her one bit. Having made her money in the financial bastions of the City of London, and bailed out just before the 2008 crisis, she had initially been living the dream. The Spanish farmhouse was gorgeous. The buildings were gently restored, the land securely fenced and her vision created: a retreat for ‘super stressed’ business people. Hers was a premium product. To stay was expensive, her coaching and workshops priced at the top end of the market. But she had no problems filling her spaces and she knew she was very good at what she did. But her great work drew great references and great references created more business for her. And more business required extra building work and project management and a separate site and staff who unfortunately didn't have some of her perspective on what she was trying to do …

Eighteen months on and she was more stressed than she had ever been in her City days. She wasn't sleeping well. Her personal meditations were full of turbulence. Her teaching lost its flow. Reviews became less excellent and more OK. Business dropped but there were still loans to be serviced …

She closed for two months. Accepted no more bookings. After the last class she decided to unplug and re-boot herself. She walked the grounds, watched the sunrise and sunset, slept and meditated. She cooked good food slowly. She ate slowly. She walked slowly. Slowly but surely her body returned to balance. She sold all additional properties, one at a slight loss: but so be it. It was, after all, only money. She returned to the core farm, a small number of rooms, the occasional workshop and coaching individuals who respected her work. She managed by herself. Personal contact was restored and she put up her prices a little.

Her flow and passion returned to her teaching. She loved it. She had needed to unplug again.