Volume 01 Issue 09: Master Your Time

What is your relationship with time? Is it a happy one or an unhappy one? Do you often feel like you don’t have enough time to do the things that are important to you? The only time we have is the time as we make use of. Time management equates to self management, implying that if we can manage out time we can manage ourselves. We are responsible for the employment of our time. We have to choose to organize our time or agonize over losing it because once lost, it cannot be recovered. Given the number of things that compete for our time in any given day, an analysis of the abundance of time reveals that we have very limited personal time. After deducting the time we spend at work, travelling, with family and at social events, we are left with very limited personal time. Hence the urgency to plan and prioritize our time in order to make efficient and effective use of this valuable but limited resource.

Assign a value to your personal time. How much is your hour worth? Once you determine the value of your time, sieve out things that are of less value. Find practical and creative ways to make optimal use of your personal time. See if there are tasks that you engage in that you find that as you do them, an activity that would better add value to your life is neglected. If you are like me, I spent about an hour most early Saturday mornings in the local market shopping for fresh groceries until I realized that that was not an optimal use of my time and requested the grocer to deliver the supplies. For me, shopping for groceries is a good task but it does not require my personal touch and attention. It is good but not important to me. Important tasks are tasks in line with our goals. What are the important things in your life that you must determine to do first? It takes planning our time and activities to get what makes a difference accomplished. Look out for things that you can effectively delegate. However, I must add that we have to be cautious not to delegate tasks that only we should do, tasks to do with raising a family for instance. We must find practical balance in the employment of our time.

To manage our time we need to identify our time distracters and deal with them. Strengthen your boundaries. Other people’s activities must not distract you from your goals. It is also worth noting that the abundance of activities does not imply effective use of time. If you find yourself busy moving from one activity to another, stop and reflect on the value you derive from those activities. If they do not serve to develop you, find ways to limit them to a bare minimum. Choose to spend your most productive time on activities that develop you and for instance, attend only the reception of a social event if your only role in the event is to bear witness. Although time is never too much, it is never too little. But it is enough. As we make deliberate efforts to master our time, our immediate goal should be to work towards the point where we can say that we have more than enough time to do the things that are important to us. As amply put by Anthony Gitonga in Made for Greatness, time is what life is made of. If you love life do not squander time.

Lillian Chebosi