Why You Need to Rethink How You Think About Time

I have an unusual relationship with time. I am always running out of it. Even though each day has 24 hours in it, more than enough time to do the things on my list, I find myself wishing I just had more time. Not only do I wish I had time to get everything done, but free hours. Hours where I am not accountable to checklists and schedules, or quantity of words written for my book or ensuring those around me are taken care of.

Maybe you are asking yourself as well: where does the time go?

Oliver Burkeman, in his book Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, addresses the "never enough time" dilemma and also throws in the consequences of believing you have all the time in the world.
 

Whether you think you don’t have enough time or have all the time you need, the reality is, time is finite and so are you.

Oliver brings the searing truth that the average time any mortal has on this earth is 4,000 weeks. That’s it.

The challenge is to understand who the human being is in the relationship between you and time. When you understand it’s you, then the choices of how to use time are yours as well.
 

Time should not be your master.
Neither should time give you a false sense of security.

So, what do you do with your time when everyone is asking for it and there is not enough to go around? When the task list is too long to squeeze into one day, never mind one week.

In Oliver’s words: "Productivity is a trap. Becoming more efficient just makes you more rushed, and trying to clear the decks simply makes them fill up again faster. Nobody in the history of humanity has ever achieved “work-life balance,” whatever that might be, and you certainly won’t get there by copying the “six things successful people do before 7:00 a.m."

The older I get, the more my relationship changes. I see that I can choose to opt out of it and instead face what is right in front of me at any given moment. It doesn’t mean I abandon my strategy, but it does mean I hold it loosely in an effort not to miss the moment.

This is the alternative Oliver offers: "...the unfashionable but powerful notion of letting time use you, approaching life not as an opportunity to implement your predetermined plans for success but as a matter of responding to the needs of your place and your moment in history."

Can you make time for what really matters? Can you have enough unplanned time to be open to what God may be placing in front of you that you need margin to see? 

Oliver reminds us: "The day will never arrive when you finally have everything under control—when the flood of emails has been contained; when your to-do lists have stopped getting longer; when you’re meeting all your obligations at work and in your home life; when nobody’s angry with you for missing a deadline or dropping the ball; and when the fully optimized person you’ve become can turn, at long last, to the things life is really supposed to be about. Let’s start by admitting defeat: none of this is ever going to happen. But you know what? That’s excellent news."
 

Maybe it’s time to rethink how you think about time.
Maybe it’s time to see time as an ally that can serve you rather than you serving it.

This is your strong way forward. I believe in you.