5 Ways To Think About Time

It was my goal when I started this blog that I would be able to help others become more organized and productive. I hope that if you’re using the tips and tricks on this blog, you’ve started saving a lot of time!

It can be so easy to use that extra time to get a jump start on the next day, start a new project, or shorten your to-do list, but I’ve realized recently that that “extra” time isn’t really extra at all. I’m going through some pretty exciting changes (we just closed on an apartment – yay!) and as I prepare to leave some old things behind to make way for the new, I’ve noticed a few important things about time:

1. Time is ephemeral – once it’s gone, it’s gone for good and you can’t save a single second for later use. When you decide to put your goals, your dreams, or the things that make you happy on hold for later, unfortunately time won’t save up until you’re ready.

2. Time is uncontrollable – you can’t speed it up or slow it down, but it’s up to you to decide what you do with the 24 hours you’re given each day. Whether or not you fill your time with fulfilling activities that make you happy or with just checking one more email is up to you.

3. Time is shared – we’re all sharing the same 86,400 seconds each day, but how often do we invest those seconds with people who make us feel unfulfilled or with whom we get nothing back from?

4. Time is a priority – and what’s interesting about that is that priorities change with new jobs, new relationships, and new cities. What’s superficially important to you today might not be tomorrow, but if you value time above all you won’t waste it on the things that won’t matter tomorrow.

5. Time is only now – we can only exist one second at a time, so there’s no point wasting this second dwelling on seconds that have already passed or focusing on moments in the future.

I know this is a little different from the typical posts that I do, but I know how easy it can be to live life in “producer mode” and forget to do the things that you want to do. A nutritionist friend of mine told me once that you’re supposed to keep a list of your favorite healthy snacks to help you make smarter choices when you’re starving. The same can be true for time – make a list of all of the things you enjoy doing or that you’ve wanted to do forever and the next time you find yourself with an “extra” half an hour, spend that time on you.

After all, Ferris Bueller took an entire day off just because “life happens fast, and if you don’t stop to look around once in a while you might miss it.”