You’ve heard about spring cleaning. But how can we apply this concept to the cobwebs of our career? (It’s not only for closets.) There are four major lessons we want to talk about when it comes to creating a positive and simplified work environment. 

Lesson #1: Good Scents Is Just Good Sense

Creating a positive and personalized physical environment in your home or office can help boost creativity, focus, and career or work-related goals. One way to do this is through the power of scent. Lighting candles and plugging in wallflowers are a few ways to accomplish this. For the modern day woman with a picture perfect office and home aesthetic, a sleek oil diffuser is definitely the way to go.

Aera is a sophisticated smart home fragrance brand changing the scent game. The diffuser is a quiet and user-friendly set up that uses no heat to produce a hypoallergenic scent effect safe for the whole family. You can even control scenting anytime, from anywhere with the AeraforHome app for iPhone and Android. Scroll down for a special limited-time discount for Create & Cultivate readers!

Aera's new Simplicity scent collection is focused on simple and familiar fragrances and is perfect for simplifying your office and home space. Each of their fragrance capsules can fill a room with consistent scent for 60 days or 1440 hours on an average setting. Our favorite Simplicity scent in the office is the White Tea. With hints of jasmine and citrus, this scent relaxes us and reminds us to take a deep breath and enjoy the simple things throughout the day.

Join in on Aera's 30-day “Simplicity Challenge”, which focuses on how to simplify areas of life including home, relationships, career, and health! Aera will be inviting followers to share their progress during the challenge by tagging @AeraForHome and using the campaign hashtag  #AeraSimplicityChallenge. One participant will be chosen weekly to win an Aera diffuser and Simplicity scent capsule, plus one lucky participant will win the ultimate giveaway of simplicity products and services - valued at 1K. Enter here.

Lesson #2: Put the Kibosh on Nostalgia

We know that we have nostalgic and hazardous sentimental attachments to our possessions. Whether it’s boxes of old photographs and birthday cards that lead us down a long and windy path of nostalgia and distraction while cleaning, to items we hold onto for no reason-- aka your grandmother’s boots you're keeping even though they’re two sizes too small. Talk about a tropical depression. The nostalgia hurricane is real and it's ruling your life.  Feeling strongly about stuff is OK but it can also be the enemy of tidy.

How to apply this to work: It's not just stuff kids! We have nostalgia and emotional attachment to ideas. So, what should we do to make space for bigger and better creative thoughts? Kill your darlings. That’s right. The creative ideas that keep falling dead in the water. Every single of one of us has that “golden” idea that we can’t escape. The one we reposition and bring up in pitch meetings, the one we’re sure is going to hit with ONE client that simply never does. Accept that. Thank the idea for taking up space in your head and let it go. 

Also, those notebooks full of half-baked ideas and sparks (ahem duds) of genius you jotted down and have never looked through— toss them. We know you’re saving them for that one time you’re going to need to reference a page scribbled on in 2007 but just say goodbye. If ideas are really that great, they’ll stick around. You don’t need to create a physical library of your own brain. 

Lesson # 3: Simplifying and Letting Go Feels Good. So Good. 

Yes! Getting rid of clutter and freeing up your home space feels great. You feel lighter, more free, and less emotionally tied to STUFF! Everything all of the sudden becomes easier when you can SEE everything! Decision making is easier when you love everything and therefore you become more efficient with your time! Exclamations abound!! (For real, this is happy, joyous stuff.)

How to apply this to work: You don’t have to do anything here! Once you start letting go of the clutter on your desk and in your head, you will free up space for the next steps. You’ll be giving your career the breathing room it needs to expand. It will also help you become more clear on what projects to say yes to, and which projects to turn down. 

You’ll feel relief instead of anxiety. Joy instead of job. 

Lesson #4: Make the Commitment to Live Simply

You make these kinds of commitments all the time— to your diet, to the products you put on your face. But what you take in through your airways is just as important as what you put in your body and on your face. With scent, you can create a space around you that is inviting and feels refreshed each and every day

Seal the deal and start making your commitment today. Join Aera's #AeraSimplicityChallenge and share the steps you are taking to achieve a more simplified life. Not only will you be entered to win their weekly giveaway and grand prize $1K+ giveaway of simplicity product, but you'll learn tips and tricks along the way to simplify many areas of your life that may be weighing you down. Follow along on their Instagram and enter the challenge here.

Use Promo Code: CREATECULTIVATE15 for 15% off all products through June 30, 2018.

This post is in paid partnership with Aera.

Have other techniques for simplifying your space? Let us know in the comments!

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