Time is precious: here's how to reclaim it

We’re obsessed with busyness!!!!!!

Our culture tricks us into believing that our schedules must always be jam-packed if we want to be perceived as valuable. Saying we're 'too busy' is an accolade we hold with pride rather than seeing it as a clue that our lives are out of balance.

When we queue at the Post Office or doctors, instead of letting our minds and bodies rest for a moment, we instinctively reach for our phones to tick off a few more tasks–check in for tomorrow's flight, send that quick email, mindlessly scroll social media.

More time online

Our most valuable resources are our time, energy, and attention, and the modern world puts all these under strain. Yet we all know that being busy doesn't mean we do things well. Juggling tasks makes us less effective, and we have little time to think with an overscheduled calendar.

On top of work and everything else, organisations are now moving to models where people serve themselves. Self-serving is eating into our time. We check ourselves out at supermarkets and check into flights. We spend so much time online that the lines between work and time off are blurred.

When we have time (!) to think about it, we want to look back on our lives and know we’ve spent it wisely. After all, you can never get it back. ‘Precious’ may sound lofty, but it’s true. Time is precious. No one knows for certain how long they have left.

Time at work?

Time is precious not just for individuals but for companies, too. Treating time as carefully as money is in a business's best interests.

That said, as Liz Ryan points out, time isn’t money. Think of the importance of ‘tasks’ with non-linear outcomes, like networking and maintaining warm relationships.

And what about developing team talent? Workplace relationships play a significant role in job satisfaction, while effective teams who work well together can influence company performance. Yet middle managers only spend 28% of their time managing their team and fostering talent and nearly half (49%) on non-managerial work, a 2023 McKinsey global survey finds.

Most of us aren't spending time as effectively as we'd like, even if we want to do a good job. Take trying to reach inbox zero; the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) found that the average employee spends 28% of their working week on email.

?

Or how about meetings??We take people’s time with meetings without agendas or outcomes, or we’re so laissez-faire with?our time that we give it away to whoever asks for it as if it doesn’t belong to us.

Luckily, companies are finding new ways to tackle the ineffectiveness of meetings. Just look at Shopify, which cancelled all recurring meetings with three or more people at the beginning of the year for two weeks. After that, employees could add essential meetings back in. Meanwhile, TheSoul Publishing went cold turkey, with no meetings or emails since 2019.

Most companies haven’t eliminated meetings just yet, but quality trumps quantity, so there’s been a rise in 15-minute meetings. After all, a quarter-hour in pure presence surely beats a 45-minute meeting where you’re disengaged, replying to emails in the background.

How to use your time wisely

You’ve probably heard the rocks, pebbles, and sand analogy. In one version, the teacher puts some golf balls inside a jar and asks his class if it’s full. They say yes. Then he adds pebbles and asks if it's full. They say yes again. He adds sand. He says the golf balls are the most important things in life, like family, friends, health, and passions. The pebbles are your work, and home. The sand? That’s all the other noise in life. If we fill our calendars (and lives) with the small stuff (the sand), there’s no room for the golf balls.

This lesson reminds us to put things into perspective. Where you allocate most of your time communicates what you value. So have respect for your own time. Keep a record of how you spend it, then set boundaries. Be aware of time and presence, protect them, and use them intentionally.

Finally, get comfortable doing nothing; it may feel unnatural, but it’s necessary. Modern life is squeezing the time you once had to yourself just to be bored, daydream, or relax. What if we reclaimed that time? If you’re going to flick through a book while you resist social media, make it one like Nancy Kline’s Time to Think.?