Making Time Management Work
SUMMARY
Time management is the key to making important things happen. Being busy is not the same as being productive. Successful time managers focus on objectives rather than activities and set their own priorities instead of those of others. Delegation is a great art to accomplish one’s own objectives. See the big picture of one’s life and goals.
EXPANDED DISCUSSION
Sometimes, as they say, we are so busy that we cannot see the forest for the trees. Most of us are incredibly busy. My question is: how much is being accomplished? What is time management? It’s the maximum return for the least amount of investment doing something that is a priority for you. How often do you think of that throughout your day when you say you don’t have time to write? We all have the same number of hours in a day. We’re all busier than it is healthy to be. But my father always said something to me, and I think he was right: you find time for the important things to you. These are your priorities. Consciously or unconsciously. Sometimes, we must be honest with ourselves because our actions may really be our priorities over what we say we want to do. But if you do want to write, and you are one of those who can’t find the time to write because there is just too much going on in your life, I want to share a list of traits shared by busy, successful people that they use to make all the difference in their lives.
Successful time managers focus on objectives, not activities. Sometimes, we get busy being busy, but we’re not productive. How is that? We focus on the activity rather than asking ourselves, “Why are we doing this?” It is the objective that is important and most often not considered. For example, if you aim to write, why are you procrastinating by surfing the Internet? Your objective, your true objective, will dictate the activities that must follow at any moment. Successful time managers set their objectives first, concentrating upon only their priority tasks, then strategically step-organize and plan their subsequent actions, and then do those activities promptly until they have achieved that activity. Then they move on to the next.
Successful time managers set their priorities, not those of others. Only you know what you want and need to do. If you constantly work on other people’s objectives, you will only accomplish other people’s goals. If you're going to achieve your objectives, then you must set your priorities. Write them down. Delegation is a great art. Just make sure that when it comes to your writing career, you are the delegator rather than the delegate.
See the forest. Always be looking at the forest. Then, pick your trees and delegate others to someone else. And then go back to looking at the forest. Do it again. In that big picture is the sum of your life and, at the end of your life, what do you want that forest to look like? Time management will give you all of that.
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