It’s crazy how much innovation we have to make things easier, faster, “less stressful”. The amount of technology that’s come around due to trying to ease and comfort our busy lives, seems to only cut time frames down for us to add in more things to get done. Not allowing for comfort or ease at all. As we seem to beat time with advancement in technology, time and time again (haha), we actually get more and more consumed.
“Time just seems to go by faster and faster as I get older.” Ever heard that line? It’s true. I think it’s true because we compare this time as when we were younger, typically with less responsibility. Of course time goes faster, whether you have children or not too. We’re consumed with more bills, more work, more stuff. We wake up, usually rushed into whatever starts first. Morning routine, to work, to packing in as much stuff in our “free time” at night, as possible. I say “free time” in quotes because well, is it really free?
Here’s the thing. Most of us are bored, yet we don’t even allow ourselves to get bored. Does that make sense? Probably not, let me explain. Think back to your dead-air time. This is time where you’re not doing a thing, and nothing specifically has your attention. Instead of being in the present moment, you jump on your phone, and go right to social media. Me too. Or the TV, if you’re at home. Me too. So we actually never get a chance to get bored, yet there’s only so much benefit and enjoyment in the phone and on the TV, and it’s usually mindless stuff to pass the time.
Add this into your everyday schedule, like it already is. And poof. There goes a week. Weekends last 9 seconds, so poof, again. It’s now next week. Where did the time go?
Well it went to all kinds of things, you just don’t care about most of them. Like the social media and TV, it’s just filler time. It’s not something you’re really passionate about, you’re not really learning, you’re not feeling much. It’s just the dead zone.
So, how do we get to taking back control of our time? The first step to taking back your time is realizing you don’t have control of most of your day. (Especially if you have kids). Shit is always hitting the fan, and our job as responsible adults is to put those fires out as they come up. How on earth could we possibly control our time when we don’t know how when these fires will come up?
We don’t. But we can adjust to what we can control. For just a bit of time in the morning, and usually at night, (especially if you have kids) there aren’t as many distractions. Waking up in the morning, most people don’t have time to have fires yet, so work/your business shouldn’t be a priority yet today. Kids/spouse sleeping, you have plenty of time by yourself. To use time. To control your time.
At night, most people are consumed with their own lives therefore you should have some time at the end of the night as well, where you’re not burdened by responsibility.
The first 30 minutes and the last 30 minutes of your day, if you’re doing it right, are the most undistracted and therefore most important times of your day. And they should be. Be present, work on you. Do things you love in this time. Make it an hour in the morning and an hour at night if you want.
So how do we take control of our time? Realize most of our day isn’t ours, and taking control of our time in the morning before everything starts, and at night after everything ends. This is how you take back control of your time.
B3FIT 