The one asset that you possess that, once lost, can never be recovered is your time and eventually, you run out of it completely. As they say, the only things certain in life are death and taxes. What kind of return are you getting on your time? Are you using it to fulfill your life? Are you using it to impact the lives around you? Or, are you just trying to survive life day by day?
A poll in 2020 found that Americans are the unhappiest they’ve been in 50 years with only 14% saying they were very happy. This was down from 31% in 2018. No doubt, we have endured quite the experience since 2020 but it highlights an important fact. Time is limited and precious. How we spend our minutes creates our happiness.
Take this into account. The average male in the US has a life expectancy of 75.1 years. And the life expectancy for a female isn’t far off from that, 80.5. That is roughly 945.5 months or 28,758.35 days. How many days do you have left? How are you invested that time? Time is your greatest asset.
Now, how are you going to invest it? Let’s walk through some commonsense steps to make sure you are fully utilizing this thing called TIME.
- Be intentional
- Be Prioritized
- Be Focused
Let’s walk through ideas around each of these steps to make this moment, and all the rest, the greatest investment of your life.
Be Intentional
“Work on Purpose, Play on Purpose, Rest on Purpose. Do not let yourself or anyone else waste your time.” Izey Victoria Odiase
I was once told that you either control your time or your time controls you. As we have already determined, life is limited. We must be mindful of how we spend our time. Who are we spending it with? What activities are we giving it to?
So, be intentional. Our world is getting more hectic by the second. Information overload is at our fingertips. We are bombarded with opportunities to sacrifice our time on petty activities from the time we wake up until the time we are back in bed. We live in a world of shows or movies on demand, news streaming and updated by the second, online games tempting us at every turn, social media at our beck and call. How do we break the bonds of time control and regain control of our intentional use of time? Below are some actions steps to help motivate you to get beyond the crazy and regain control.
If you are not on your phone right now go ahead and pick it up. Right in your hand, you have one of the most powerful, yet underutilized, tools known to mankind, a calendar. Go ahead and plan out your day, your week, your month, your year. Start to take control now. Be intentional with how you are going to spend your time. What activities are you going to spend focusing on yourself, your family, community, your health, your career? While there are more tools to make an art out of planning and a way of life just start. Right now.
In this same vein, start each day with a plan. As your day begins just pause everything else and plan. My favorite movie quote, from For Love of the Game, is “Clear the Mechanism”. Start your day by clearing the mechanism and focusing on how you will intentionally spend each moment.
When we are intentional with our time and energy we are more likely to achieve the goals. Starting our day with intention helps to ensure that our day has a clear structure for being active in the areas that will bring us joy and satisfaction.
As you begin this practice you will find yourself aligning with your core values which will, in turn, increase your creativity and productivity. Being intentional helps to align your actions with your goals and ensures you focus your time on what is truly important to you.
Be Prioritized
“If you don’t PRIORITIZE your life, someone else will.” Greg McKeown
We are all given 24 hours a day. How are we going to spend that time? Assuming that you get a full 7 hours of sleep in a day you have 17 hours remaining to live your life and to have experiences. This is 1,020 minutes that, from the moment your feet hit the floor, begins to tick back to zero. How are you prioritizing those 1,020 minutes?
Take a moment to think about your hopes, dreams, and aspiration in the following six areas of your life.
- Family & Home – You might be single with no children or extended family or you might have a companion with multiply children. Your family and home will look completely different than mine. No matter the difference, are you satisfied with how you are prioritizing your time with your family and your home life? Are you happy with the quality of the relationships that matter the most?
- Spiritual and Ethical – No matter your religious beliefs are you living up to the values that you feel in the center of your being? Are you honest with yourself and those around you? Do you honor your commitments?
- Social & Cultural – Are you connecting with your community, whether virtual or brick and mortar, in a manner that fulfills you? Are you immersed in your culture or open to experience other cultures in a way that make you more complete?
- Physical & Health – We have discussed the average life expectancy, 78.79 years, for a US male. That is the average. Are you prioritizing activities that will allow you to beat the average? The older I get the more I realize that I want to beat the average as an active health contributing member of society. Are your priorities expanding or degrading your health?
- Mental & Educational – Studies have found that a contributing factor to happiness is lifelong learning. Those that prioritize the learning experience are more connected, more fulfilled than there counterparts. What books do you read or listen to? Are you taking advantage of the power of YouTube and other resources that abound in information that can enhance your knowledge. You don’t have to be enrolled in school to learn. As you look back over the last year, what lessons have you learned? Were those lessons acquired because of missteps made or purpose driven acquisition of knowledge? Knowledge is power.
- Financial & Career – Do you have a defined retirement plan? How about a defined vacation plan? Do you vacate from your daily rat race to disconnect and recharge? Similar to the quote regarding priorities, if you don’t manage your money your money will control you. How about your career? Are you satisfied but aspire to more responsibility and a larger paycheck? Are you in a rut and feel like you need to make a career move but, 10 years into feeling this, you wheel continue to spin and you stay where you are?
Now that you have considered what your current and future desires are for each of these areas, are you living your life in a manner that your to-dos are working to fulfill those hopes, dreams, and aspirations? While very few do win the lottery, most do not attain any level of wealth without purpose that is executed based on our priorities. We will dive deeper into the action steps you will begin taking to take back control of the priorities in your life in order for you to live your best life. You have complete control of your destiny.
Be Focused
“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.” Alexander Graham Bell
There are tools aplenty to help you stay focused. Apps that can be downloaded to your phone or programs for your computer. I have used many of these over the years with varying levels of success. If these tools were the end all be all to being focused then how were some of our ancestors able to attain such greatness. There were the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, and Marie Curie to name a few. They did not have the tools that we have available today to help them stay focused.
Below is a list of actions that I have implemented that are backed by science and research that have helped me and countless others become laser-focused.
- Eliminate Multi-tasking – You can fool yourself into thinking that you are an excellent multi-tasker but studies show that the opposite is true. The human brain actual lacks the ability to execute two or more tasks at the same time. So, while you believe you are tackling multiple tasks at a time your brain is actually switching between these tasks. So our perceived ability actually positions us to be more of the “SQUIRELL” mentality, switching back and forth and losing focus.
- Meditate – For me, intentionally pushing the pause button to relax and breathe helps me to recenter my mind on my priorities. If you are opposed to meditation in principle then just breathe. Deep breaths in and out for five to twenty minutes. Matter of fact, give it a try now. Set a timer for whatever amount of time you desire. Get comfortable, sit upright or lay down and breathe deep breaths in and out. Force your mind to stay away from the noise of your day. Focus on how you can be more intentional, control your prioritization and be more focused. There are several options on YouTube or multiple apps that can help to make this a part of your daily routine. Below are links to a 10 and 20 minute meditations by Vishen Lakhiani that I have found very beneficial.
- Exercise – I have made it part of my morning routine to wake up at 4am and head to the gym before I tackle any other tasks for my day. I have not always done this but since I have implemented this as part of my morning routine I can speak first hand to the resulting focus. According to John Ratey, associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, regular exercise promotes brain health. This can add to memory capacity and our ability to concentrate through stimulating the release of a chemical called brain-derived neurotrophic factor or the rewiring of our memory circuit.
- Priority List – We have already talked about being prioritized. Well, this meaningful deliberate prioritization, when written down, will provide you a map for where your time will be spent. You are forcing yourself to focus on what your prioritize.
- Take a Break – Early in my career I dug my heels in and was determined to win the game by putting in nonstop hours. Then, one day I step out for lunch. Just me, not with a group, but just me to take a brief walk. That afternoon was one of my most productive focused afternoon I had experienced. I now have a practice of disconnecting a few times a day from my priority list to focus on me.
- Sleep – Poor sleep leads to poor focus. What is your night time routine? How is your transition to activity to sleep preventing you from getting a better nights sleep?
There is a lot here to digest but this is the start of your journey. If you think of this information as a map this is your starting point. You are now fueled up, vehicle ignition is on, now you must determine your destination. Let’s briefly touch on your path to this point.
- Time is your greatest asset. Don’t waste another second!
- Be intentional. Don’t let life just happen. Make YOUR life happen. We get one shot that spans an average of less than 80 years. Take advantage of every second, minute, hour, day, year, and decade!
- Be prioritized. This is your life. You take control of your “to-dos”. Be deliberate in what actions you allow yourself to tackle.
- Be focused. Align yourself like a laser to accomplish those things that are most important to YOU!