Where Did All That Time Go? - Ep. 131
06/10/15 • 16 min
Have you ever seen one of those time-lapse video’s in a bus station or maybe in a big city intersection? Everybody is flying all over the place in this jumbled mess of massive activity. They all have somewhere to go or something to do, but when you look at it from that level, it looks like something that borders on chaos.
This is how our day can look when we glance back at it and wonder were all our time went and why we didn’t get all of our stuff done. We see a mass busy-ness with what seems like a lot of productive activity.
But...
When you slow it down, zoom in and see what actually happened, you notice, there’s one person in the train station who walked up to the newsstand and stayed there for about 30 minutes, just flipping through magazines. You notice another person who ran into a friend and 40 minutes later, said farewell and continued on.
This is what happens in our day. From a distance, it’s a mass of activity, but when we really look closer, we see the Devil in the details.
Start An Activity (or Productivity) Journal
If you ever want to know why you can’t lose weight, even though it seems like you’re trying, start a food journal.
Write down every single thing you eat and what time you ate it. Make sure you record the quantity as well. There are apps that can do this for you, including one I like called MyFitnessPal. You can use it to see if you’re staying within your calorie goals and if your macro nutrients (Protein, Fat and Carbohydrates) are in alignment with your desired diet plan (I won’t get into what I think is best... too controversial).
The same thing is often recommended when someone starts a household budget ... and certainly with every business, they need to be tracking where every dollar goes and comparing it to their budget.
In households, you start by writing down EVERY penny you spend. Do it for a given period of time so you can capture as many of the infrequent items as possible. Today, we have apps like MINT which will do this automatically. Just make sure you’re assigning everything to a category and you’re including your cash expenses.
If this works for food and for money, it will work for time as well. But I’ve only met a handful of people who take the time to do this. Most people believe their too busy to spend the time it would take to write down everything they do all day long, for a few days.
BUT, I DON’T HAVE TIME
Honestly, you don’t have time because you don’t take the time to figure out where your time is going.
I was reading about someone who broke their day up into 6 minute blocks and wrote it all out on a sheet of paper and then started filling out where each 6 minutes went. 10 blocks per hour.
You can even set a reminder on your smartphone to ask “what have you been doing the last 6 minutes.
Maybe 6 minutes is too detailed... don’t let that stop you. Begin by looking at every 15 minutes just four times per hour. If it’s really tough, do 30 minute increments.
I think anything bigger than that wouldn’t give you a clear idea of what happens with your time.
You only have to do this for a few days.. a week at the MOST and it will give you SO much insight, you’ll instantly know where your time is going and you’ll be able to adjust what you expect from yourself each day.
Categorize The Results
Break down your results into several different categories.
I would definitely include something called “LOST TIME.” This is down time that wasn’t intentional. You just saw someone in the hallway and you started to chat about the NBA finals or something. Next thing you know, 20 minutes are gone.
Some other suggested categories are:
- Meetings
- Phone Calls
- Answering Email
- Research
- Rest Time (intentional)
- Eating
- Family Time
- Travel
You may have a few others that work for you.
Tools to Use
There are some great tools you can use to keep track of this, but honestly, I’m going to keep those for Friday’s episode.
Call to Action
Do this today... even if it’s just during your work hours, write down what you’re doing every 6, 10, 15, 20, or even 30 minutes. Take action
Also, go back to episode 66. I talk about creating a Time Budget. It’s really the next step after doing today’s project.
Have you ever seen one of those time-lapse video’s in a bus station or maybe in a big city intersection? Everybody is flying all over the place in this jumbled mess of massive activity. They all have somewhere to go or something to do, but when you look at it from that level, it looks like something that borders on chaos.
This is how our day can look when we glance back at it and wonder were all our time went and why we didn’t get all of our stuff done. We see a mass busy-ness with what seems like a lot of productive activity.
But...
When you slow it down, zoom in and see what actually happened, you notice, there’s one person in the train station who walked up to the newsstand and stayed there for about 30 minutes, just flipping through magazines. You notice another person who ran into a friend and 40 minutes later, said farewell and continued on.
This is what happens in our day. From a distance, it’s a mass of activity, but when we really look closer, we see the Devil in the details.
Start An Activity (or Productivity) Journal
If you ever want to know why you can’t lose weight, even though it seems like you’re trying, start a food journal.
Write down every single thing you eat and what time you ate it. Make sure you record the quantity as well. There are apps that can do this for you, including one I like called MyFitnessPal. You can use it to see if you’re staying within your calorie goals and if your macro nutrients (Protein, Fat and Carbohydrates) are in alignment with your desired diet plan (I won’t get into what I think is best... too controversial).
The same thing is often recommended when someone starts a household budget ... and certainly with every business, they need to be tracking where every dollar goes and comparing it to their budget.
In households, you start by writing down EVERY penny you spend. Do it for a given period of time so you can capture as many of the infrequent items as possible. Today, we have apps like MINT which will do this automatically. Just make sure you’re assigning everything to a category and you’re including your cash expenses.
If this works for food and for money, it will work for time as well. But I’ve only met a handful of people who take the time to do this. Most people believe their too busy to spend the time it would take to write down everything they do all day long, for a few days.
BUT, I DON’T HAVE TIME
Honestly, you don’t have time because you don’t take the time to figure out where your time is going.
I was reading about someone who broke their day up into 6 minute blocks and wrote it all out on a sheet of paper and then started filling out where each 6 minutes went. 10 blocks per hour.
You can even set a reminder on your smartphone to ask “what have you been doing the last 6 minutes.
Maybe 6 minutes is too detailed... don’t let that stop you. Begin by looking at every 15 minutes just four times per hour. If it’s really tough, do 30 minute increments.
I think anything bigger than that wouldn’t give you a clear idea of what happens with your time.
You only have to do this for a few days.. a week at the MOST and it will give you SO much insight, you’ll instantly know where your time is going and you’ll be able to adjust what you expect from yourself each day.
Categorize The Results
Break down your results into several different categories.
I would definitely include something called “LOST TIME.” This is down time that wasn’t intentional. You just saw someone in the hallway and you started to chat about the NBA finals or something. Next thing you know, 20 minutes are gone.
Some other suggested categories are:
- Meetings
- Phone Calls
- Answering Email
- Research
- Rest Time (intentional)
- Eating
- Family Time
- Travel
You may have a few others that work for you.
Tools to Use
There are some great tools you can use to keep track of this, but honestly, I’m going to keep those for Friday’s episode.
Call to Action
Do this today... even if it’s just during your work hours, write down what you’re doing every 6, 10, 15, 20, or even 30 minutes. Take action
Also, go back to episode 66. I talk about creating a Time Budget. It’s really the next step after doing today’s project.
Previous Episode
What to Do When You Feel Lost in Life - Ep. 130
I love auto racing. I used to dream of doing some cross-country rally racing back when I was in my early 20’s. I loved the complexity of it. With a rally race, it’s not like other types of auto racing where you’re on a track, you drive fast, turn left, drive fast, turn left, drive fast... and continue like this until you see someone waving that checkered flag.
If you’ve ever seen Cannonball Run, a movie from back in the 80’s, you know what a rally race is like. It’s a real race that happens every year. In Europe there are Rally races through towns and cities all the time.
In a rally race, you drive for days over long distances. You have to know where you’re ultimately going and your checkpoints along the way. I thought this was a great analogy for this episode...
Sometimes Lost is Good
Sometimes feeling lost is great. We must have down time - Sometimes our spirit our soul will force it upon us by causing us to feel “lost” or to remove our drive for a specific destination. Consider this a rest area in life. Don’t set up camp here, but but realize, you need a break from time to time. So, rest.
Sometimes we even need to just go out for a drive without a particular destination. Just go out, start driving and enjoying what’s right in front of us without being worried about where were going, if we’re on the right path to get there, whether we have enough gas, and if we’re making good time or not.
We need the mind clearing drives sometimes.
Why We Sometimes Feel Lost
Usually, at least for me, we feel “lost” because we’ve become distracted.
If you’ve ever been driving somewhere with someone and become so engaged in conversation, you completely miss your exit, you know what this is like.
When this happens, you have to first become aware of the fact that you missed your exit. Awareness of where you are at this moment. Then you have to figure out how to get back on track.
Sometimes you get so far off track, you actually have to pull over and stop while you get your barrings right, pull out a map and rechart your course.
In life, this could mean pulling over for a while... a vacation or just a day when you can get away from all the “traffic” in life... no distractions. You may even just set up an afternoon to go to beach and collect your thoughts, evaluate your destination and reassess the path you’ve chosen to take.
The last thing you should do is to try to keep driving while you pull out the map and figure out where you are and how you need to get back to where you were going. Doing this could cause a lot of issues for you and completely derail your journey.
Take the time to STOP... clear your mind.. and get back on track. STOP... that’s important.
Using a Navigator
Continuing with the “driving” analogy, you may want to consider bringing a navigator with you. Someone who will keep track of where you’re going at all times and alert you BEFORE you get off track.
A couple of ways you can do this is through a coach, accountability partner or even a mastermind group.
This is the purpose of these people in our lives. But, you have to make sure they know where you want to go and they know your plan on how to get there. We also have to make sure we give them the authority in our lives to give us direction. You can NOT argue with them and challenge everything they tell you.
In cross-country rally car races, there’s a driver and a navigator. The driver drives... watching what is right in front of them and making sure they don’t crash. The navigator looks further ahead to see if there are any detours on the horizon and get the driver ready to react to them.
Listen, if you’re just cruising along in life, you’re not racing towards a goal, you don’t need a navigator, but if you want to accomplish something amazing, you’re going to need to really stay focused on what you do well... driving the car.
At Least Use a Map or GPS
I understand if you’re “car” isn’t big enough to accommodate a navigator at this point. At the very least, use the tools which will let you know if you’re on track and where you need to go if you do get lost.
Your long and short term goals will do this for you.
Your long term goal is like the finish line in this rally race. It doesn’t mean this is the only race you’re run in your lifetime, but it’s the one you’re in right now.
Your short-term goals are where you need to go to get to the next gas station, or next check-point. Rally races usually last several days. This means you check in each night, the timer stops and you refuel, rest and recharge your body. You also make sure your map is still accurate.
Call to Action
Grab your map... designate a navigator (maybe you can navigate for them if they’ll navigate for you).
Know where you are today and where you need to be tonight, if you’re going to make...
Next Episode
Avoiding "Decision Fatigue" - Ep. 132
Our brains can only handle a certain number of decisions before they just slow down.
There’s a fascinating study put out about prisoners facing parole boards. Here's an article about in the New York Times. They looked at 1,100 decisions over the course of one year.
Prisoners facing the parole board in the morning were paroled about 70 percent of the time.
Prisoners facing the parole board in the afternoons were paroled less than 10 percent of the time.
The study indicated, the judges ability to make sound decisions wore down as time went by in the day.
A closer look at this study shows decisions in favor of parole would spike up right after a lunch or afternoon break.
A lot of decisions - or big difficult ones.
Last Wednesday in episode 127 we talked about how we could increase our self-discipline if we focused on having it in one area alone. So instead of trying to cut smoking, learn a new skill, eat healthier and start exercising, just focus on doing one of them at a time until it becomes a mindless habit and then move to the next one.
But, this idea goes beyond just our projects. It applies to all of the decisions we make each day.
The less we have to make, the more disciplined we’ll be in making good ones.
Eliminate the unnecessary decisions
I saw a very successful Facebook friend of mine the other day posted a photo of what he eats every day. No, not a bunch of photos showing each item, but one photo with the food he eats every day... as in the same thing.
This friend said, “By eliminating the need to decide on what I’m going to eat, I free my mind up to focus on important decisions that matter more than what I’m going to eat.
Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg and President Obama
This same friend said he owns 20 or more identical polo shirts other than the color. He wants to eliminate that as a fatigue factor. The same pants, the same shirt... every day. No need to agonize over what goes well with what and if you have a pair of shoes to match.
Mark Zuckerberg was once asked “Why do you wear the same exact T-Shirt every day? His response was, and I quote:
"I really want to clear my life to make it so that I have to make as few decisions as possible about anything except how to best serve this community,” He went on to point out that every decisions is using our “decision energy tank.”
President Obama said “I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing because I have too many other decisions to make.”
Steve Jobs wore his iconic black shirt everywhere he went. Whether it was to introduce the brand new iPhone or going in for a normal day at work, he had that same black shirt on. It was for the same reason the president and Zuckerberg cited. Decisions fatigue.
If you’ve ever spent a day at the mall, you know this decisions fatigue is real. in fact, I’m suspecting this is how Cinnabon has made a fortune. By preying on mentally fatigued shoppers who would normally say no to something like a sticky gooey cinnamon bun. Brilliant!
Just for Decision Days
This doesn’t mean you throw out all of your fun clothes, but it means, when you wake up Monday morning, you’re going to go into the closet, grab a shirt (they’re all the same) pants and shoes and go into work. No decisions no fatigue.
You can have another section of your closet where you keep your fun going out clothes. That’s fine on the weekends or for an evening event. But, for daily work... keep it to the same thing and save that decision energy for the important stuff.
Call to Action
I have to admit, I’m entrigued. I’m working on so many things at once, I’m always feeling this decision fatigue and I know I would benefit from something like this. I’ve already started this with my weekday breakfasts and I may even do the same for lunch.
This isn’t easy for me... i love food. My wife could do this without any problems, but I thrive on variety in my food.
The clothing I think would be much easier for me. It just means I’ll have to buy a week of identical clothes so I don’t have to think about it.
Will you try this with me and report back on how it worked for you? I really want to see if this will help with self-discipline.
Let me know if you will... you can reach me on Twitter at PDesmondAdams or send an email to [email protected]
Now.. to decide what that one piece of clothing is going to look like. Haha...
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