Since Time Can Not Be Managed, What Can We Manage?
A Different Time Management Philosophy – Part 3
Don’t be fooled; having practices and a desire to manage your time isn’t enough. In fact, I believe this concept of managing time is an illusion altogether. That being said, allow me to be and say something extreme. As you know I have a habit of going extreme left or extreme right. Time can not be managed. Time can not be controlled. To go even further with that thought, time doesn’t need a manager. Time was given to us as a gift to manage ourselves. It is interesting to note that society (that which is common and normal) would like us to believe that a person can manage time. Actually I should not be surprised by this at all because that’s what normal does. Reminder, this is next level time planning – lessons on managing time. Therefore, it’s not for people who wish to remain normal in this concept.
Let me give you two reasons why I feel so strongly about this:
1) You can’t manage nor control time.
2) Managing time is really code for managing getting things done.
I need to come clean on something very key. This book (and this content) is not for the average person. To be honest with you, the person who decides to live an average life can’t use what we’re about to say. If you desire to accept what the books have been telling you about time management that we’ve all tried and practiced, yet didn’t work, well be my guest and continue that effort. However, what I’d like to do is give you a philosophy which simply takes what we know and uses it to push us beyond normal habits and behaviors to get the result we desire, not the illusion of managing our time.
You cannot manage time so what can you do?
“You can not manage time, you can only manage yourself.” – John Maxwell
I really like what John Maxwell says here. In fact, he’s one of few people to ever admit that time is not what needs to be managed but rather it is managing ourselves that’s the key. Let’s take this next level thought a little further. Normal thinking is the belief that we can manage our time and it is also the belief that we need to manage our time. So if we can not manage time then what can we manage? How do we manage ourselves?
The one thing we can manage is our efforts within the time markers that we have. In simple John terms, we manage tasks not time. What one wishes to do is get more done in the time marked out, be it one day, one week, one year, etc.
Managing time is code for getting it done.
What I realized after hearing these words is that managing time is code for something else. Just like the word “someday” is code for never. Time management is code for how can I get it done. Whatever “it” might be. How can I get the desired tasks done in the time I have marked out? In other words, how can I prioritize what gets done so that the items I desire to be done get done. I will insert this here and will certainly speak more about it as we continue in this area; time is budgeted similar to the way we budget our money. As you know, the average person overspends or spends more than one earns. Because of this and in addition to our normal spending habits, we abuse time in the same way. We try to spend more time than we have earned. The problem, which is huge, is that you can earn more money to spend, however you can’t get not one extra second of time. Once it’s used, it’s gone for good. Therefore, managing ourselves becomes very critical. In fact, it’s more vital that we budget our tasks to time than our income to what we’re spending.
If there is but one single take away I want to leave you with it is the idea that no one can manage the unmanageable; which is time. However, what we can manage then should become our focus. When we find that we have something that’s beyond our control, it makes one a victim. To avoid being a victim when it relates to what we get done, we have to find that which we can control. What we place within our time-markers is something that gives us back control of what we call the illusion of time management.
Question: what is being a victim to the illusion of time management keeping you from accomplishing?
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