Quantum Happiness Series- harvest time and energy

 “Show me where you spend your time, and I’ll show you what you love.”
—Levi Allen

We can’t buy or store time nor energy; therefore, they are our most valuable resources.   In order to overcome ennui and accomplish our goals, we must guard these resources diligently and at all costs.  Prioritizing is key to conserving and directing our time and energy toward what is most important to us.

We get exactly 24 hours in every day, and to stay healthy we need to schedule at least eight of those for rest. To break free and stay free of ennui, the remaining 16 must be used constructively.

Habits such as spending time on C priority tasks all day while an A or B looms large in the background set the stage for a toxic reaction later, leading to fatigue and irritability, both symptoms of ennui.

Purchases can also be unexpected time thieves. When buying something new, we commit time and energy to that item. So, we must calculate the cost in time, energy, responsibility, and money when considering a purchase.

Tons of Time

When evaluating time, be realistic and follow the monitor (found at the end of this section) for as long as it takes to determine your daily habits, usually around a week. Then take a hard look at where your time goes.

Look at the big chunks first, such as sleep and work. These are usually set. As mentioned earlier and in a later segment, sleep is a nonnegotiable when battling ennui. So, prioritize eight hours every night.

Then look at the smaller segments:

·        Did you spend hours on the phone or computer?

·        Did you spend inordinate amounts of time on C priorities?

·        Did you participate in any activities that do not support your goals?

 

When I began addressing my time management issues, I found I was investing time in organizations, activities, and relationships that demanded much and produced very little in return.

Okey-dokey, Smoky

For instance, we had a dog at the time, Smoky, who refused to stay home. No amount of chain link or special equipment could keep him in the yard. Not only were we wasting money trying to keep him home, but far too much of my time was spent chasing, securing, and tending to a dog that didn’t want to live with us.  After a family vote, we decided to give him to some friends who had always admired him.

They didn’t even have a fence, but he stayed there and never gave them any trouble.

The morale of that story is sometimes we are not only doing ourselves a favor but possibly the other party as well by reevaluating commitments that don’t serve us. That dog lived happily with them for a decade. I think, he was looking for them all along.

We will discuss ways to politely withdraw from activities in Part Two: The Communication Connection.

How to keep others from wasting your time

Engagement exercise 1: 
Time monitor- Spend seven consecutive days documenting your activities in 30-minute intervals (Sample on next page and worksheet follows.) At the end of each day, categorize individual activities into one or more of five categories:

1.     Planed activity. (P)

2.     Unplanned but necessary activity. (U)

3.     Screen time (any electronics). (S)

4.     Nonproductive time. (N)

5.     Resting and relaxing. (R&R)

 

Engagement exercise 2:

Now look at each of the categories and evaluate where those lost hours are hiding.

·        How many hours (outside of work) did you spend in front of a screen?

·        How many hours did you spend on tasks that could be delegated or dismissed?

·        How many hours did you spend in pursuit of your goals?

 

Time monitor

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Vacay Q&A playlist: Tons of time