Your Time Is Yours To Manage

There are more than a few good books on time. The Time Paradox by Philip Zimbardo, 168 Hours by Laura Vanderkam, The Time Trap by Alec Mackenzie and if you want it straight from a theoretical physicists' perspective, The Order of Time by Carlo Rovelli are excellent foundational reads. But it is one line from The Almanac of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson that struck me deeply. And it displays how ruthlessly efficient Naval is with his time and I think we can all benefit from his practice.

In The Almanac, Naval is quoted as stating the minute he deems something not worth his time, he moves on. It doesn't matter what it is. It could be a party, a conversation, a book, he moves on. It gives him a certain peace of mind to manage his time in this manner, and I whole heartedly agree.

We seldom view our time as our most precious commodity, but it is. We never know how much of it we have left yet many of us behave as if we have infinite amounts of it. We eat like time doesn't matter. We behave in relationships like time doesn't matter. We all live with this liberty regards to time like it will always be there. It won't. Our time is fixed. This holds true for us all. Money, fame, status, success, none of this gets you more of it. It wasn't until I hit my mid-forties (I'm 49 now) where it hit me hard about how much time I have actually wasted in my life.

There are a few things necessary to get into the mindset of ruthlessly managing your time to optimize your life.

The first thing is to be clear about your purpose and what you value. This is where your time will be focused. Everything else is noise. This gives you direction and empowers your process. Living in your values and your process keeps you present and presence helps to slow time. Entropy is the universal law that comes for us all. It is where our linear concept of time comes from because heat loss only ever moves in one direction. Practicing presence slows entropy and empowers gratitude.

The next thing is to understand that you and you alone are responsible for the management of your time. If you do not hold yourself accountable, your time will most certainly be influenced and manipulated by extrinsic sources and these sources care little about your time. They will use your time to service their own.

The third notion is one of the concept of harmony. We all have a natural bias for harmony, for consonant interference. Harmony is a balance of sorts that keeps us in alignment in our existence. It is the preferred homeostatic state for growth and healing. It is a very specific frequency that only comes with effective time management within the self.

You don’t owe your time to anyone. You are not obligated to sacrifice your most important asset to anyone. If you want to live a high quality existence and invoke Parkinson’s Law in your life, manage your time effectively and be serious about where, what, and whom you choose to invest your time in. The first place to invest your time that will yield the most benefit will always be to yourself, to your personal development, healing and growth. When you become the person you want to be, you attract like minded people, experiences and situations. These are the things you will want to invest your time in. The people and relationships you choose to invest your time in are important. You don’t want to waste it because you cannot get it back. How you manage your time is a habit, an important one. Be clear about what you want and value and invest wisely.