We have all the time in the world

A google search on Time management gives about 1,94,00,00,000 results (0.49 seconds). Time is most sought after and most pervasive commodity. Time is most perishable commodity that we use, it lasts for a miniscule moment, in fact it doesn’t last even for that miniscule moment, it’s in constant flux. Time is the only wealth which is evenly distributed in the world. It is most forgiving and most unforgiving entity. Unforgiving, because once a moment is gone its gone forever, and forgiving because the next moment is always available to you, to be used.

To use every moment to its fullest, you need to be present, in real time. That is the only time when the moment is there for you to use, the past is gone, and future is yet to come. You cannot live in your past and expect your future to take care of itself. To succeed in life you must live for today and invest in tomorrow. There are millions upon millions of people who prefer to live their lives in times dead and gone. They dwell on what they had or could have had. Past some time is real nice place to be, it’s a nice escape from your present anxieties worries. It’s a virtual game that you play with yourself. But by very nature of it being virtual, how so ever hard you play it; it won’t make any difference in your present.

You can’t change your past, once in a while a random stroll in your past is ok, but if you spend too much time there, then it might jeopardise your present, as James Baldwin said “People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them” Living in past, if it becomes a habit, is a vicious trap. It will always impede forward movement.

To move forward and progress in life they have to let go of the past. It’s impossible to make something worthwhile of their future if they’re living in the past. Why waste your time thinking about what you had or could have had when there is nothing you can do about it? That time is gone. Forget the past, especially the old wounds, which you unnecessarily carry with you through life. Remember, when you dwell on past hurts injuries today, you open up fresh wounds for tomorrow.

When your thoughts are always on past victories, previous relationships, opportunities missed and mistakes made, you create within yourself feelings of insecurity, worry, fear and uncertainty which adversely affect your future decisions.

The past can be beneficial only if we use our good memorise to motivate us for the future and if we learn from our past mistakes. A case study can never become a present day’s reality; it can only give some pointers which might help you solve your problems. There is no déjà vu, out here. I am not fighting a case against past or for future; past present and future are separated by infinitely small moment of time. All three definition of time are constant movement, they are not static states. The miniscule moment is all we have, we can take action in that miniscule moment only, because the one which passed is beyond our control and the one which has not arrived is beyond our imagination.

Staying in the past is one of the biggest time killers, and can shoot down any time management exercise in moments. Going down the memory lane can be an addictive.

The best time to do anything is now. An interesting observation, those who accept that they waste their time and have wasted their time in past, they could have done something great, had they utilized their time properly, they are wasting their time now without realizing that their present is quickly getting converted into past, a past which is shouting out loud that hey I am a wasted moment, which was all yours to act. Therefore, the moment one realizes, he should start action, no time to brood, no time to contemplate, no time for crying or self-admonishment.

There are two worlds one is perception world and the other is reality. Perception is what we trust we are what we think we are doing; it’s our image that our mind has built, mostly it is the “should” or the ideal, that we take as perception. Few years ago, when I was heading an IT education center, I used to go to the office at 9.0 AM and used to leave my office after 7 PM, and almost every member of my team was also equally punctual. We always believed that we are working very hard and so did our family members.  The owner of the institution chain, my boss, a retired captain from Indian army, one day suggested an exercise to me and my team members in administration. He asked us to note down whatever we do during the course of the day and the time that we spend on it. Approximate time was ok, as it was not practical to record the exact time spend. At the end of the day, he asked us to segregate the task that we did, to our surprise in almost 9 to 10 hrs that each of us spent the core official work was only for roughly 3-4 hours.  Rest of the time was used in non-productive work, which was not at all associated with the core work that we thought were doing.

The key is measurement; anything which is measured can be improved. The awareness about incompetency only can help someone remove that incompetency; facilitating the transition from unconscious incompetence to conscious incompetence to unconscious competence and finally conscious competence or strength.  Hence it’s a good Idea to set some benchmark, some measures, and some checks which will help you measure yourself. 

Benchmarks like writing down your task which you wish to finish by the end of the day. Then you can measure yourself against the percentage of tasks allocated against completed. It’s better to keep the list as realistic as possible. We have a tendency of stuffing everything in a day, and end up having a long list of unfinished job at the end of the day, therefore while making the list the realistic time estimation is important. There are certain tasks like making some phone calls, doing follow up, sending email which don’t take long but we end up spending much more time on these tasks than needed, so a discipline is must. No list how so ever perfectly made, will not work unless the time discipline are adhered to. Identify your time wasters and avoid them consciously. One of the biggest time wasters is social media. The platform like WhatsApp, twitter, Instagram and Facebook can devour your productive hours without you even realizing it. Keep off from them, or schedule them towards the end of the day.  

You may design your own methods of handling your time in a productive, satisfying and fulfilling way. Time is there for you to take and use it, as famous Jazz Singer sang many years ago, “We have all the time in the world”.