priorities Archives - Successful Blog

Keeping Time

I think my life has sped up in the last few years.
Do you feel the same way?

Things that need doing seem to pile up faster.
Things I want to do keep coming up more quickly too.
Are you having the same experience?

These days I think of time off as the luxury of time to do what I want to.
And I ease into Mondays with ideas of keeping time working for me.

Keep Time Working For You

Time is flexible. We can waste time, spend time, invest time, have a good time, even use time to plan how we’ll use it. We’ve been know to stretch time and cram things into it. Some people actually speak of killing time. Why would you do that? The only thing we can’t do is get more of it. Twenty-four hours in a day is what we get no matter what we do with it.

I’ve spent some time considering the time I spend when I’m feeling like I don’t have enough of it.

If you want to know what you value, look where you spend your time and who you spend it with.

We Make Time for Things Important to Us

Here are a few truths about time that I’ve become aware of. You should too if you want to keep time working for you.

We make time for the things we know are important.

We find time for the things we want to do.

We use time to find things that will save us time. Sometimes using up the time we had do it whatever we would have been doing.

If we can’t find time to do something, we don’t value it as much as what we’re already doing.

When we take time for ourselves, we’re not so tight on the time we spend on others.

Time is the only resource we can’t renew. We need to use it while we have the time to. Time well invested gets us closer to the people we care about. When we spend time focused on what the relationships, projects, and businesses we’re building, we build them better.

This week, before time gets away from you, take a few moments to choose one goal that’s important to you. Decide to focus your attention for a set amount of time each day on that important goal and see what happens. Quality time focused in that single direction will have an exponential effect. But you knew you.

Be aware of the things you’re doing and the time you’re spending doing it.
Are you spending your time on what you value?

How do you keep time working for you?

It’s irresistible to be generous with your time.
Be irresistible.
–ME “Liz” Strauss

Whoa! Look around us!

Everyone is so . . . busy. We’re almost can’t see each other.

We’re juggling, talking, typing, scanning instead of reading, talking instead of thinking, putting off time with our family and friends. We all know so much about productivity, goals, keeping connected, and following our passion to build the business that we love. It’s enough to make a brain shut down into auto-mode.

I know I occasionally find myself staring out from a glazed look, walking into walls. How about you?

Being determined, motivated, set on a path with a laser beam focus is a good thing. . . . right? It is, if every now and then, we check that our destination is still where we want to go and that we’re enjoying the ride on the way.

The Going Not the Getting There

I see it in clients. I’ve felt it in my friends. I’ve done it myself. It’s a heads down sort of thing that takes over our thinking. We become so aware of time, so time-managing, that we manage to set aside anything that might, even possibly from far off, appear to be construed as doing nothing.

What’s wrong with doing nothing or better yet doing something just for fun — not balance . . . F-U-N? What’s wrong with enjoying the folks we care about as we move through our lives?

Nature has no straight lines.

Our priorities can get so straight that they become twisted and upside-down. We can get so focused on our destination that we forget to pay attention to the journey and the people who make living our lives magical, meaningful, and worth living.

Way, way back in the olden days, Harry Chapin sang this in a song.

It’s got to be the getting there, not the going that’s good. –Heads and Tales, Greyhound

We’ll never get this moment back . . . oops, it’s already gone!

At the end of my days will I regret the work I didn’t do or the time I didn’t spend with my husband, my son, my dad, my mom, my brothers, my nieces and nephews, my lifelong friends, the new exciting people I’ve just met?

If you knew that your time left was only tonight, what would you do then?

I’m going with Bruce Cockburn’s answer . . .

If it was the last night of the world, I’d have champagne with you. –Breakfast in New Orleans, Dinner in Timbuktu, Last Night of the World

Yep, that’s what I’d do.

I’m making a sign and putting up right above my monitor.

Will you make a sign too? It’s the time of your life.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Keep Time Working … For You

Keeping Time

Keep Time Working For You

We Make Time for Things Important to Us

Working Smart or Working Away the Time of Your Life?

The Going Not the Getting There