Everyone has a baseline level of daily frustration they learn to live with. These are typically small annoyances that aren’t serious enough to demand attention. However, they’re persistent enough to wear you down over time. Individually, none of them ruin your day. Collectively, they create a low-grade irritation that affects your mood and your energy.

The interesting thing is that most of these frustrations are fixable. While your life is unique and all of these may not apply to your specific situation, here are some common things the average person can do to make their life less frustrating on a day-to-day basis.

1. Fix Your House Like You’re About to Sell It

Let’s do a little thought experiment that changes how you see your living space. Walk through your house and look at it the way a buyer would during a showing. Pay attention to things like:

• Scuffed walls
• Dripping faucets
• Doors that don’t close right
• Small drywall holes
• Loose cabinet handles

Most people just deal with these things. Then they decide to sell, spend a weekend fixing everything, and realize they actually like their house. But what if you did that sooner? You don’t need to go through the exercise of selling your house to fix it up and fall in love all over again. 

Walk through every room with a notepad and write down everything that bugs you, no matter how small. Then start knocking items off the list one or two at a time. 

2. Stop Tolerating Spam Calls

Is there anything more consistently annoying than spam calls interrupting your day multiple times a week? Yes, it’s a small interruption each time, but over weeks and months, it builds into a big frustration.

Start with the basics. That means registering your number with the National Do Not Call Registry. It won’t stop illegal robocallers, but it does cut down on calls from legitimate telemarketers who comply with the law. Another step is to enable your phone’s built-in spam filtering. Both iPhone and Android have settings that silence calls from unknown numbers and send them directly to voicemail. 

If you’re getting repeated calls from specific numbers, particularly debt collectors or companies that won’t stop calling after you’ve asked them to, there are additional steps you can take. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) restricts how companies can contact you by phone, and violations carry statutory damages. A good TCPA attorney can evaluate whether the calls you’re receiving violate the law and pursue action on your behalf, often at no upfront cost. 

3. Streamline Your Morning

A chaotic morning sets the tone for a frustrating day. If you’re rushing, forgetting things, and leaving the house already stressed, you’re starting from a deficit.

Most morning chaos comes from decisions and tasks that could have been handled the night before. Spend a week taking proactive steps before you go to bed at night. For example:

• Lay out your clothes before bed. 
• Pack your bag. 
• Prep your lunch. 
• Know what you’re having for breakfast. 

Every decision you eliminate from your morning routine is one less opportunity for something to go wrong or slow you down. Combine this with waking up 20 minutes earlier than you usually do, and your days will start at a much more reasonable pace.

4. Organize the Spaces You Use Most

Clutter almost always results in friction. When you can’t find things, it puts you in a mental headspace that you don’t really need to be in. Thankfully, it’s totally avoidable.

While it would be nice, you don’t need to organize your entire house. Focus on the spaces you use most frequently. This is typically the kitchen counters/drawers, entryway, bathroom vanity, and home office. These are the spots where clutter accumulates fastest and creates the most daily friction.

Start by giving everything a designated place. Things you use a lot get the most accessible real estate, while items that don’t belong in high-use areas get relocated out of sight. It’ll shock you how much of a difference this simple exercise makes for you.

5. Automate the Recurring Tasks You Keep Forgetting

Think about all of the mental clutter banging around in your head on a daily basis. Whether it’s bills that have to be paid or prescriptions that need to be picked up, there’s always something urgent. But what if you could automate most of these recurring tasks? Well, chances are you can.

Make it a point to automate everything that can be automated. For instance:

• Set up autopay on every recurring bill. 
• Use your pharmacy’s auto-refill program. 
• Subscribe to filter delivery services that send replacements on a schedule. 
• Set calendar reminders for appointments that need to be booked in advance.

Taking these things off your plate will free you up to focus on the things that actually require your creative energy and thought.

Recalibrate Your Daily Life

None of these changes are dramatic on their own, but that’s kind of the point. The compound effect of removing small points of friction from your daily life is far greater than the effort required to fix them. Knowing this, take some time to address these issues and start enjoying your life more!