Have you ever had one of those days where you wonder where all of your time went? I know that I have those days sometimes, and today was certainly one of them. It seems as if in between doing some of the things that I wanted to do and needed to do, not much else got done. It seems like there was some kind of time monster following me around, gobbling up spare bits of time here and there so that I had less time than I thought.
We all know that there’s no time monster following us around, eating up those bits and pieces of time that we leave behind in between getting things done. The time is all there, and each of us has the same twenty four hours each day to do with what we wish. This may sound like the ultimate freedom, until you consider all of the things that you want to do and need to do with your time. Things like getting eight hours of sleep each night, preparing (and cleaning up after) nutritious meals for yourself and your family, getting regular exercise, making sure that the kids get enough fresh air, taking care of your home, and working at your home-based business can easily fill an entire day. There are so many more things than that though, things that need doing that do not seem to get done today or tomorrow, things that you put on your to do list two months ago that are still there because they have not yet been checked off.
There are two solutions to the dilemma of too much to do and not enough time to do it. One involves becoming more efficient and paying close attention to how you use your time to see whether you can fit more into each day. I’m sure that I could benefit from taking a hard look at what I really do every day to see where there’s room for improvement. There is also the option of looking at that to do list and crossing off things that are not truly necessary, things that are on there because other people think you should do them or because you feel guilty about not doing them. If they are not of real value to you or your family, these things can get crossed off the list once and for all. The best solution for getting through the feeling of not having enough time is probably a combination of these two approaches. I’ll have to try combining them tomorrow to see whether I can get more done and/or feel better about what I did do.
How do you deal with the “time monster”?
Photo by clarita on morguefile.com.