Fill in the blank. What’s the thing you can’t seem to get to?
It’s no secret that we live in busy times. It seems like we’re continually on the go. And our to-do (or “want-to”) list never gets fully checked off.
I deal with this all the time in my day job. I work at a company that builds software for healthcare providers. If you’re in the US and you’ve received long term care or home health care, there’s a good chance your caregiver was using my company’s software to organize and document your care.
Caring for people is a noble calling. Even if we’re just helping the people doing the caring. So we are very aggressive in what we want to do. As a result, we have projects on top of projects.
As I talk to different teams, I hear this refrain over and over.
“I don’t have enough time to do that.’
Can you relate to this? You may not be associated with healthcare. But it’s super common to have more plans and projects than available time.
Sometimes the “surplus” is lots of small little activities. “I don’t have time to read my Bible or to pray.” That’s a little activity – could just be a matter of minutes per day. Or it could be a big thing. “I don’t have time to lose weight or get healthy.” That would require a much larger commitment of time for a sustained duration.
Odds are, when you saw the subject line of this email, you automatically filled in the blank with something from your own life. Something that you have been talking to yourself about.
This is really coming up big for me right now because I’m looking at a new role at work. And I know that it will amp up the demands on my time. I know that time management is going to be a real challenge over the next half-year as I try to get settled in to the job.
I’m asking myself these questions:
- Can I stay regular with reading the Bible?
- Can I invest further into my prayer life?
- Will I be able to do more writing projects?
- How can I do Bible teaching?
- How much time can I invest into leading the prayer team at church?
- How can I offset my desk job (and desk hobbies) with healthy activity that keeps me fit?
This is ground zero in my life right now.
What would your list look like?
At work, I have an answer to this. I can’t stand it when my colleagues say “I don’t have time for that.”
Here’s a true statement. “Everyone has the same amount of time.”
The only variable is what our priorities are.
Ouch.
That hits close to home.
We do the things we value. It doesn’t matter what we say we value, we only need to look at our actions to see the actual values of our lives.
How much time I give to work and the increased responsibilities I’m looking at is a statement of how much I value work. And this time allocation has ramifications for all the other things I say that I value.
What’s the pinch-point for you?
Whenever you feel like you “don’t have enough time”, that’s a signal that it’s time to look at your priorities. Are they what you think or what you want?
Perhaps it’s time to have a sit-down think about what you truly value.
I know I’m doing that. Deep inside me, I am pretty sure that I’m going to give up somethings that previously I said I wanted to do. Things I don’t have time to do. Things that really don’t carry the priority that they need to stay on my radar.
Interestingly, some of the things I think I’ll say “NO” to, relate to you. So I’ll be sharing these decisions with you as they get finalized. This is part of my accountability process. So long as these decisions are secret, it’s really hard to pursue them. So I’m planning to make them public and strip them of that secret power.
And I’ll offer you the same.
If this email put a finger on a tender part in your life, you can take a simple step of response. Reply to the email and share what it is that you’re wresting with from a time/priority conflict. What is it that you keep saying “I don’t have time for that” – but you know that it’s important and you should be doing.
I predict that you will feel a sense of relief by typing out the words and pressing SEND. It will break some of the power of secrecy that makes the struggle so desperate.
This is your invitation to share with me like I have shared with you. I won’t laugh and I won’t judge. I’m too busy wrestling with my own dilemma.
I hope to hear from you soon…
Dennis
