so much to do, so little time
Today’s hectic pace of life means that most of us find ourselves in the obvious imbalance of too much to do and too little time to do it in. The issue is obviously one of expectations – we expect too much of ourselves and those expectations keep getting bigger. And bigger. Get on top of your emails and you’ll find people send you more. Figure out how to spend more time with the kids and you’ll be expected to exercise more and tidy the garden. The bad news is that it’s how the system works.
Most of us have, at one time or another, attended the age-old time-management courses and the unspoken assumption is that it’s possible to win the game: to find a slot for everything that matters. But it’s a rigged game from the onset, it’s a game you can’t win. This leaves only one option: identify what things you want to do, prioritise them into your schedule and accept that a lot of them won’t get done. Yep, a lot of unimportant things will not get done, and a lot of important things won’t get done either! In our over-expected world the only way to lead a manageable and meaningful life is to accept that some friendships will be neglected, some parties will be missed, some sports never adopted, some fantastic experiences never experienced.
Learning to say no is such a cliché but learning to say no to the things you actually do want to do is the key to unlocking your life. Our only hope of staving off the inevitable passage & wasting of time is to limit our precious use of it.
