It's Not That You Don't Have Time. It's Just Not a Priority.

By Jackie White

Here is a quote that changed my life:

“It’s not that you don’t have time, it’s just not a priority.”

Ouch, that literally made me wince!  I mean, like wait a sec, I want to complain about how busy I am. I want to explain away why I don’t have time for exercising or organizing the basement boxes or reading 2 books per month. We all have the lists of things we “don’t have time for”, but the reality is…

“It’s not that you don’t have time, it’s just not a priority.”

No, but really, there is stuff I really want to do…like get together with friends or work on a fun project I have pinned to Pinterest 6 months ago. Why isn’t that getting done either? We all have good intentions, but getting the get together scheduled or the project ready to complete is becoming a hassle and just don’t have time to do it, or maybe…

“It’s not that you don’t have time, it’s just not a priority.”

How about what about how we get into reactive mode and don’t think to plan ahead and then suddenly, the parent teacher conferences are this week and you haven’t scheduled it and the time slots available are few and far between. Now, it’s a major production and trying to schedule it is impossible! You don’t have time to deal with this either, but the truth is…Ok, I know, you got it! But, it’s this kind of scenario that can really causes the stress and anxiety. It’s when you should have made something a priority and didn’t and now it’s biting you in the butt.

So, that darn quote is a major slap in the face, but sometimes the truth hurts. I know it made me sit up and think about just how am I doing in the Planning Department? How are​ you doing in the Planning Department? How do we move past the chaos we are currently drowning in or prevent it from happening? And just how do we prioritize?

We turn to Stephen Covey and The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People for direction on how to prioritize our lives.

Begin with the End in Mind:
Prioritize what’s important, not what’s most urgent. This is going to take some thought up front, but will make your life so much easier! Spend time identifying what is important in your life, relationships, recognizing new opportunities and planning ahead. This process is teaching you to be proactive in your life, not reactive. Ding Ding Ding! A-ha moment alert!

How to do this:
1) On Saturday or Sunday spend time reviewing the upcoming week.

2) Identify what tasks need to get done. Tasks and activities like cleaning the house, making dinner, paying bills, errands, work related activities or tasks fall in the need to get done category.

3) Identify which tasks are important to get done. Important tasks are things like spending time with your husband or kids, making time for yourself, exercising or pursuing a passion.

4) Put a star next to all important tasks. Important tasks must be scheduled into your weekly plan. All other need to get done tasks you will prioritize with A, B or C. A means it is a top priority, B is a secondary priority and C is the lowest priority, meaning maybe it can be scheduled in another week.

5) Using a planner that has time blocks for the hours in a day is helpful to schedule your day’s activities. Remember the starred items must be given a time slot as well. Also, remember to schedule travel time for things like taking kids to lessons or driving to appointments. There’s no teleportation available yet! 

A note about planners: There are online planners you can use if that best fits the way you live or choose a paper planner that is easy to carry with you. Forget the big clunky planners  you won’t carry it with you. Been there. Done that.

This process may seem a little daunting the first couple of weeks, but once you get into the groove of which category a task falls into then you will be able to prioritize easily. You will see how this process streamlines your priorities and time management. It will become second nature and as a result, you will be less harried, more accomplished and will be attending to those things that are important in your life. Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!

Other Things to Consider

Manage your energy, not just your time.
According to Daniel Pink in his book, When. There are certain times of the day we are better at doing certain tasks. The Peak is in the mornings are when we should be handling analytical tasks. The number crunching or head-down focus needed tasks. The Trough is early to mid-afternoon is when we should be doing an administrative work such as answering emails and filing expense reports and the Recovery stage which is late afternoon to early evening, is when we should be doing insight tasks such as brainstorming. If this makes sense to you, then think about scheduling your day’s tasks around the Peak, the Trough and the Recovery energy phases.

 I don’t have time for me...Ok, then make time for you.
Give yourself the gift of time. Carve out 1 hour each morning just for you. If you have to get up earlier to do this, you must. It is a like a tune up for yourself. You keep your car running properly with regular maintenance and you need to do that for yourself too! This maintenance is for you. It’s a spiritual appointment with yourself. It’s a time for you to get yourself grounded for the day and for life.

This Power Hour will nurture your mind, body and soul :
​
Mind: 20 minutes of reading something inspirational.
Body: 20 minutes of exercise. You can combine exercise with reading if you listen to an audio book or podcast!
Soul: 20 minutes of meditation and/journaling. Doing this calms your mind and helps you to focus on what’s important in your life.

​If you could use some help getting organized, give this process a shot, you might find that suddenly, you have so much more time than you ever thought possible. You will find that you aren’t frantic and you are scheduling what’s important in life. You will have time to breathe in life and enjoy it. What a gift for you and your family!

Shine On!