You Can’t Manage Time
To be candid, you can’t actually manage your time.
You can only spend it.
How then would you spend an extra 25 hours in your week?
That’s basically an extra 3.5 hours added on to each day. Or one whole extra day each week!
Seem impossible?
Let’s break down an average week to see where all the time is going…
One week = 168 Hours
Let’s break it down…
- Sleep: 56 hours (8 hours / night)
- Work: 40 hours
- Commute: 4 hours on average (if you even have one of these anymore)
- Hobbies and relationships: 15 hours (family time, date night, meals, gardening, etc.)
- Exercise: 6 hours (a 60-minute workout every day, with a recovery day)
- Life admin: 15 Hours (eating, showering, etc.)
- Chores & Errands: 5 hours
What’s left over? 25 hours! 25!
How would you spend that time?
I’ve asked a lot of folks this question before.
One of the most common answers is that they’d love to have more “me” time — time for reading, study, and just being quiet in the mornings.
Or perhaps you’d take a longer lunch break and use that time to connect with friends more often.
Or maybe you could really use that time to work on a passion-project or side-hustle.
Maybe you’d use it to volunteer and serve in your community.
. . . . .
You can’t take advantage of those 25 hours if they are currently just slipping through the cracks.
My suggestion for really taking ownership of YOUR time is to:
- Track it
- Block it
- Enjoy it
This is how you win the game of time management.
First you have to track it. This is important because it’s the only way you can really be honest about how your time is currently being spent. Fortunately, you don’t have to track your time forever. Even just tracking one week of your time will be eye-opening.
Secondly: you have to block it. This is the simple, effective approach to truly taking ownership of your schedule. It’s how you create boundaries to protect the things you WANT and NEED to do, so that nothing lame can sneak in and rob your hours.
Lastly: Enjoy it! That’s the whole point of this stuff. As I mentioned on Friday, a good productivity system is one that will not only help you be more efficient but it will also reduce anxiety.
If you want to get back hours of your life each week, we can show you how.
Brand-New: Simple Time Management course
Our new Simplified Time Management course shows you exactly how to track your time and how to create a time block schedule. And this will help you ensure that you are spending your time on all the best things.