Wasting Time is Wasting Life

Try this for one week and you’ll change your life. Make a chart with columns, each column representing a specific activity, for example “Going to the Washroom”, “Driving Car”, “Watching TV”, “Internet”, “Email”, “Selling”, “Appointments” be as specific as possible. Then divide each column by 24 for 24 hours per day. Each hour, list your activity in the appropriate time block. At the end of the day, total the columns. You might find that you spent 3 hours driving, 2 hours on e-mail, one hour eating, 2 hours TV, one hour in an appointment, two hours with your kids, whatever. Add as much detail as you can. By the end f the week, you will have a clear overview of how you spent your life / time over the past week.

You can then get smart and start evaluating the return on investment from all those time expenditures, the quality of the people you spent time with, the value that you received from those activities and choices, and on and on. The more you evaluate and interpret your choices, activities, time allocation and the return on investment, the more you ask yourself, “Did this activity take me closer to my objectives? Did this choice help me achieve my goals? Was this time expenditure aligned with my values and mission statement? Does this person help me or hurt me? What better alternative could I substitute for this time block?” the better you get.

Being slightly obsessive compulsive, I do this all the time. Do I need to brush my teeth six times a day? I think not. Save time. Was this person a loser or a winner? Loser? No more appointments with him. Upgrade, improve, clear out the trash. Is this relationship producing results? No? Remove, delete. Is this activity working? Yes? Spend more time on it. Accentuate the positive. Remove the negative. Do I participate in this club, group, service club, fraternity or church because it adds massive value to my life or because it’s a tedious and boring habit? I resigned from a fraternity, a networking group, and a service club, which gave me massive added time.

Be objective, get your emotions out of the way, and most of all, remember that when you resign from any club, you will be attacked. No “Thank you for all you have contributed” – no – they will simply ignore you or attack you. Don’t be surprised – it’s the old Group Dynamics at work. They can’t help it. Just close that book and move on. And if you’re wading through a boring book just because you started it, or because it’s uncomfortable to end it, or a movie or a conversation or relationship or a visit, have the guts to close it, stop it and walk away. It will pay off big time. Family and friends are more important than strangers and when you do business with friends you're really optimizing your time - see photo.

When you squander your time, you’re wasting your life. And your life, I’m sorry to remind you, is running out. You have less of it left than you may think. Enjoy it. Optimize your time. Make the best of what you have left. The same goes for your business. Throw out the tired old networking and advertising and cold calling and put your business and relationships on steroids through the power of Joint Ventures, the biggest time saver ever discovered. It’s time to excel. It’s your time. It’s your life. Enjoy it.

Robin J. Elliott www.dollarmakers.com www.jvwisdom.com