Time Management IS a myth.

We have been sold a fantasy, which is great for the writers of books, and not so good for us. Here is the reality – time is a finite asset, and once it is spent it is gone forever. It is impossible to manage it, harness it, stretch it, make more of it, or in most cases, do more with the finite resource of time we have each day. Rather we need to look at time as a finite asset, which requires spending it wisely rather than wastefully.

When I was 10, my family took me to the State Fair. This was a big event in my life, as was the $10.00 that I received as spending money. Here was the deal – I was responsible for using my $10.00 wisely as it was to pay for all of my activities that day. $10.00 equals 1000 pennies, and I thought care-fully about how I was going to spend each and every one.

Time is similar to my trip to the State Fair. We all have 168 hours available to us each week. If one deducts a modest 7 hours per day for sleep, we are left with 120 available hours for absolutely everything we want or need to do. That is the reality, which leaves us multi-tasking away, hoping that we will somehow be able to create a different outcome.

So, if time is finite, how can we spend it wisely?

I challenge you for a moment to think of your 120 hours (which is 7200 seconds) much like I thought about my $10.00. I want you to stop and consider what would happen if you took a deep breath and contemplated how you want to spend each minute of your weekly allotment before you spend it. Consider for a moment what the quality of your life would be if you made choices about expending your minutes, rather than reactively going through your day. I wonder what would happen if you looked at each of your minutes as a precious asset and spent that asset towards enriching your life and living your values.

Many, if not all of us, spend time on a daily basis getting clean, brushing our teeth and putting on our clothes. Many of us also spend anywhere from 40-60 hours per week working (and for a significant number of us, working at something we don’t really enjoy). Given that most of us spend time engaged in activities that do not enrich our soul, support our goals or make us happy, it is no wonder that books on “time management” make the best seller list. Our magical thinking process suggests that if we could manage our time better, then we can have more of it. Clearly, this way of looking at time as a controllable resource is a myth.