Time is a precious commodity that
should be valued by each individual. We must learn to number our
days and not take anything for granted. Not counting your early
years from 1-15 or your latter years from 65 and over, the average
human being has approximately 15,000 days of productivity
available. This equates to a little over 40 years' worth of time.
Be conscious of how you use each day and make sure that they are as
productive as possible. Even when you are in the midst of a bad
day, it should still be used productively.
The older we get the less time we
have, and the more we become set in our ways. As adults our life
can be pretty full with a daily grind that often can be very
repetitive. Not only can we feel that we don't have enough time to
purse a 'childish' passion of ours, we often barely even have time
for ourselves in general. An average adult's day might resemble
something like this: Wake up, make breakfast, take the kids to
school, run late to work, slave for less money than we are really
worth for 8 to 10 hours, pick up the kids, head home, (that is if
they don't have soccer or ballet practice that evening), listen to
over dramatic stories about your spouses' or children's day ,
prepare dinner, get ready for bed and repeat the same process all
over again the very next day. Ahhhhhh now that's the life!! Well,
at least a very draining one.
When you are caught up in life's
everyday cycle it can often seem impossible to escape. Time is not
something that you might have randomly available on a given day, or
a decade for that matter. The good news is the problem isn't with
the clock, it's with you. Being efficient when it comes to time
management is a skill that successful people tend to master. Sure
your day might seem full now, but how many seconds, minutes or
hours do you spend each day inefficiently? Take a deeper look at
your day and be willing to change a few patterns. Take shorter
lunch breaks while at work and dedicate 20 minutes per lunch period
to your goals. Designate time to multi task. Make business calls
while doing household chores. If you usually get your day started
at 7am, wake up at 6am. Let your will to accomplish outweigh your
time constraints.
You also have to be willing to
work under less than ideal conditions. As I write this chapter I am
ironically double parked on a random street in Harlem while I wait
for a friend to meet me for dinner. Let your work travel wherever
you travel. With the advent of tablets, laptops and multifunctional
cell phones it has become easier to take your work on the go.
Remember to jot down ideas, no matter how small or seemingly
insignificant. Throughout the day you may have random thoughts on
improving your business or you might even identify an idea for a
new business. Your mind is trying to be creative and is pushing you
toward your goals, allow it to happen freely and do not ignore
it.