When there’s not enough hours in the day!

It is the dreaded December, how, when this month happens each year and the date of Christmas does not change, do I always find myself thinking that I am running out of time and that more is looming than I have time to deal with.

So this is how I started my day today?

• 19 days to Christmas – with no presents bought!
• Overwhelming workload, partly self-created through over active thinking!
• Planning dinner for 16 guests - 1 week
• My mental wellbeing is struggling

I could probably go on but I will spare the gory details! I felt out of control, stressed and ineffective.

With all that in mind work today was starting with a 3-hour training session. I was joining as an observer, and although I’m really interested in the content and how it could really support some of the other work I am doing, in my mind, I could definitely better spend the next 3 hours working on some of my deadlines. How many of us often think like that – how we could better spend our time? Nevertheless, I decide to go to the training and rush last minute to the session.

The session is called 'Thriving as a Leader', it’s one of the modules as part of our Leading@Sage program and strongly supports our Health and Wellbeing program. The training session is delivered by Jenny Flintoft who works as a consultant for Mind Gym – she’s awesome and so is the session!

Part way through the session was where I had one of those WOW moments! Among many things discussed, one of the areas we talk about is time - the pressures of time, how to maximize time and how we manage time. It is our greatest friend yet can be our biggest enemy.

So, what is this powerful creation that is time? 

Here’s the science bit…

Physics is the only science that explicitly studies time, but even physicists agree that time is one of the most difficult properties of our universe to understand. In the sciences generally, time is usually defined by its measurement: it is simply what a clock reads.  

And here’s my view…

Time is something that allows us to control our daily lives, or, allows us to be controlled by a list of things that we need to do. In short, I think it’s actually a phenomenon that we make up to give us some control, or lack of it, as we manage our days. It’s a stick we beat ourselves with when we’re not achieving, it that thing we worry about that we won’t have enough of, the thing we may run out of and die before we're ready and the constant checking of the watch as we launch from one thing to the next.   

So, I’m going to stand back and reflect and stop making things up – like time! Nothing in my list will go away but if I am in control I can influence how I face what started the day as challenges.

• Christmas isn’t just about the presents, it’s about that shared time with my family. That is definitely the most important thing, it always has been. That is already sorted, I have time off work booked, arrangements for the festive period to spend time with family and friends and I still have 19 whole days and nights to shop (and the internet is an amazing invention)!
• Workload – there is a lot to do, we live in 2017! But it’s not all my responsibility, it’s about working as a team and prioritizing, everything will still happen just not all at the same time. Work will be busy but I need to prioritize and plan so that my break from work will be a break from work.
• The dinner for my friends is about being with my friends, as long as we’re all together that is the important thing. The food, the venue, are all just the extras, being together and sharing ‘time’ is the priority and that could happen in a garden shed with a bag of crisps and would still be a fabulous night.
• I need to focus on me a little bit, well a lot! Go back and re-read my blog on how I felt after my holiday. Use the car drive on my way to work to relax and take stock, smile at the amount of traffic from busy excited shoppers, delight at the bright crisp skies of winter and take in the beauty of nature. Starting a new fitness regime isn’t going to work at the minute but having a plan to start in the new year is something to celebrate.

Just looking at things differently has made my world feel much calmer and I feel back to the Di that thrives under pressure rather than the Di that hides under the duvet and begs for it to be January. There’s no point in letting that Di win as January will only bring a whole new round of challenges. By learning to approach them differently and look from the outside in I can continue to thrive.

So from my session today, has it helped me to Thrive as a Leader? – absolutely, but not only that, I need to remember that if I can create the ripples of positivity then all the people around me will benefit too.

Whether time is made up or not becomes irrelevant, however stepping back and looking at ‘time’ pressures is very relevant.  I am now back in control and owning December and so pleased I took the time today to invest in myself – it has been extremely productive.

What are your top tips from keeping it together at busy times? Do you let time control you and do you think we just make it up? I'd love to hear your comments.