Pt 1: Most Valued Actions

Daily Dose of Integrity

Enjoy this 7 part series on Advanced Time Management!

Starting the list

Write a list of every single activity you do on a normal weekday. Yes, everything!

This includes more than just the basic work tasks, but also the personal stuff. From picking your kid up from daycare through to washing the dishes, checking emails without answering them, and scrolling through social media.

You can exclude going to the toilet, sleeping, and eating, but you might want to include things like food shopping, meal prep, and anything else that might be able to be done better.

Doing just this list is a wake up call. When you have to be honest with yourself about all the other things you do each day that eat up minutes and mental bandwidth, you’ll already start to see where some gains can be made. You’d be amazed at how often you check your phone, or read emails without doing anything about them.

Most Valued Actions

Your MVA is the activity or behaviour that best aligns with your core values. I don’t mean that your boss appreciates it, I mean that you will look back one day from your death bed without regrets so long as you made this a priority.

Go through your list, and give each of the activities a rating out of 10 for how aligned they are with your core values. Be honest with yourself as best as you can.

If you’re doing this digitally, you can rearrange the activities in a hierarchy from highest to lowest rated. Or if written, you can use highlighter pens to single out those that scored in the top 20%.

Stop for a moment, and reflect on the difference between how you prioritised these tasks compared with how you spend your hours each day. Does your future self regret time wasted or smile with pride?

Stay tuned for Part 2!