Time Management is a Bad Word

I am sure you have had weeks where you just can’t get everything done, when you start a list of to do items but forget them because your mind is too full. This has been the case the last two weeks for me.  My husband likened it to Bilbo Baggins in The Fellowship of the Ring where he describes himself as feeling like butter spread too thinly on a a piece of toast.  

Spread too thin.  Too much to do, too little time.  Always thinking about that one thing you need to get done before the end of the day.  

Options to help manage your time are plentiful: using time management apps, writing a list of the next days activities at night right before you go to sleep, perhaps most importantly, learning to say no. 

Self care books and apps abound as well; making sure you eat three meals a day, learn to nap (a favourite of mine), eliminating unwanted emails, building in unstructured time, whatever that is.  

I’ve decided to just multi task. I don’t do one thing at a time, I do several.  When I’m on the phone I clean, because it’s easy. When I go for a walk I learn lines for my play or think of ideas for my next blog, and maybe write it too.

It’s true that I get scattered sometimes.  I lose my keys weekly, possibly daily (I just need more pockets). I know the story about how doing one thing at a time produces a better result. But honestly, a half cleaned kitchen during that phone call is good enough for me.

But then yesterday I read an article about thinking differently that made sense for me. It’s not about time management, its about priorities. Consider your priorities for the day, and let go of everything else. I like that, it is simple and easy to do. Its not a solution, but if I think in terms of priorities, I feel easier letting go of things that I just don’t want to do. Housecleaning seems to come quickly to mind.

So I’m going to give that a try and see if it works. Right now I am fitting this blog in before a lunch date with a relative from out of town. That lunch is a priority. If I get this done, well and good, but if I don’t, that’s OK.

If you want to chat about time management or anything else, just give me a call or email at differentpath17@gmail.com.