My Essay Blog

Benjamin Franklin wrote: “If you want to enjoy one of the greatest luxuries in life, the luxury of having enough time, time to rest, time to think things through, time to get things done and know you have done them to the best of your ability, remember, there is only one way. Take enough time to think and plan things in the order of their importance. Your life will take on a new zest, you will add years to your life, and more life to your years. Let all your things have their place.” When you read Franklin’s words, what do they mean to you? Do you have enough time to balance your personal needs with your commitment to the outside world? Is stress causing havoc in your life? What exactly does it mean to have your life in balance and how do you achieve it?

Balance is defined as stability of mind and body; a state of being in balance; and harmony in the parts of a whole. The Chinese art of Feng Shui describes balance as being comprised of Yin and Yang energy. Yin is the calming and peace-giving energy and Yang is the action-oriented dynamic force. Yin energy engages receptivity and allows rest, rejuvenation, healing, dreaming, and acceptance. The fire energy, Yang, makes achievement of dreams a reality and creates success. Feng Shui believes every ‘whole’ person requires balance in his or her life force energy.

The key to creating ‘wholeness’ is learning that we must take care of ourselves in order to be able to give what we want to give in our roles as parent, spouse, employee, etc. When we do not take care of ourselves, we end up either sick and/or feeling burned out, as our bodies and mind will make us take the time if we will not do it for ourselves. Emotional and physical health requires taking responsibility for our own well-being.

Most of us have the fantasy that somebody will come along and tell us ‘it is now our turn,’ and so we put off the biological need for rest and relaxation until we are ill. After learning that there is not going to be anyone to rescue us, we realise that the only one who is going to take care of us is, in fact, our self. Once this is recognised, the emotional and physical healing of self can now begin. (I don’t know about you but I am a slower learner. It took me a long time to learn this. In fact, I still get a wake-up call every once in awhile when I choose to get sick rather than rest and take a break.)

We need to allow time each day in order to take care of ourselves. When we do take time, leave the guilt and thoughts of ‘I should be doing…’ outside the door. Instead, recognise that we deserve a few minutes of time for self and that we will be able to function better afterwards. Enjoy that time.

Time Management and Creating Balance

Time is defined as a period during which an action, process, or condition exists or continues; and management is defined as the act or art of managing. Time management is nothing more than the art of managing an action. In other words, the management of time is management of self and setting priorities for self. It is the conscious selection of where we will place our attention.

Reasons for Managing Time

• Time is not a renewable resource. When it is gone, it is gone forever.

• Everyone has the same amount of time.

• The creative thought that emerges from balanced lives and from the joy of our leisure time is what makes the difference in

our level of creativity and productivity.

• Take time for silence. Silence and solitude are opportunities for thinking and for simply being.

• The best thing you can do to enhance your value at work is to take care of yourself.

• Time management provides structure to one’s life and in turn, provides peace of mind.

• Time management is something one does for one’s own psyche to make one’s days easier.

Time Management and Creating Balance at Home

1. Determine what’s important to you and in what order. Prioritise to get the important things done by putting ‘first things first.’

2. Set goals and strive towards a sense of purpose and fulfilment.

3. Get organised and manage your time with a daily or weekly schedule.

4. Recognise your limits and have realistic expectations for yourself. You do not have to be ’super person.’

5. Reward yourself.

6. Keep things in perspective. Say to yourself, ‘This too shall pass.’

7. Exercise and eat nutritional foods.

8. Think happy, as life seems to be easier when you smile. Use humour and find a way to laugh at the situation.

9. Be honest with yourself and others.

10. Say ‘No’ to the ’shoulds’ and ‘Yes’ to the ‘wants’ in your life.

Time Management and Creating Balance at Work

1. Make sure your work life is a meaningful expression of your life purpose.

2. Decide to do it. Set up a TO DO list, prioritise A’s, B’s, and C’s. Do A’s first.

3. Planning - take 5 minutes at the end of the day to clean up your space and get organised for the next day’s work.

4. If you have a problem, just before you go to sleep turn it over to your subconscious - your mind will work on it as you sleep and you will have an answer the next day.

5. DO IT NOW. Procrastination is a result of saying “I’ll do it later.”

6. Do not schedule early morning appointments that will disrupt your morning routine.

7. Say ‘NO’ to every new request for your time for the next month (saying NO to every request will minimise your guilt).

8. Think about it before you say ‘yes’ - say ‘I’ll get back to you.’ Some of us are compulsive ‘yes sayers’ when we are asked to do something; taking a few minutes to think about whether we have the time, energy, or desire to perform this request requires that we have a moment to check in with ourselves.

9. Give yourself a break. People are more productive when they take a few minutes away every couple of hours.

10. Don’t let other people’s ‘hurry sickness’ dictate your life.

Remember: There is no such thing as a lack of time. There is nothing more important in your life than your time. Mahatma Gandhi wrote, “There is more to life than merely increasing its speed.” In other words, the fundamental question is: ‘How much of my life-force energy does this cost?’

Well not really, you have to know where you are and where you want to be in order to improve anything. So deciding that your time management skills are poor, and learning how to get better and where you want to be is time well spent. How ever in saying that if you’ve been searching for time management information for days now, and are still looking for a perfect solution there’s a chance you’re procrastinating. Just one trait of someone with poor time management.

So what can you do to start improving your time management right away?

Make lists and prioritize

Often it’s not that people aren’t effective with their time rather they just don’t spend the time they have doing the right things. We’re all guilty of this at one time or another, but some of us are habitual with it. The easiest way to determine if you do this is to make a list each morning, or the night before of the things you need/want to accomplish

the following or that day. Once you have your list prioritize the items from greatest to least importance. Now spend a day and perform the tasks in the order you prioritized them. This does two things.

a.) It shows you what you need to accomplish in a day so you now have some urgency because you know there are other tasks to get done not just the one you are currently working on.

b.) It ensures that the most important items are being taken care of first.

There are times when we can’t finish every item on our list but at least we took care of the most important issues first.

Learn to say no

You can’t do everything for everyone. Following our list exercise above it’s obvious that if you have a list of 20 things and only time for 10 of them in a day then it’s hard to accept additional activities from others. Of course there are trade offs that a more important task could come along and you exchange it for another task you were going to do that day. This gets into another discussion on life priorities such as friends, family, career, remember balance is also important. But you can’t do everything so if the boss wants you to work late that night, but your supposed to see your son’s hockey game

you have to be able to say no somewhere.

Don’t book every moment of your day

Now while we’ve preached lists, daily organization, and learning to say no you do need to leave some room for flexibility. Booking up every moment of your day so that you’re on a minute-by-minute schedule can be a big problem if a mini crisis occurs in the day that wasn’t accounted for.

Use other tools

Using day planners, or PDA’s to keep track of appointments and to do lists will save time and promote organization on all levels. Also keeping good contact information whether it be in a contact database on your computer or in an address book will save time when you need to contact people.

Time management is an efficient tool of performing the tasks within a given time limit. In this context, Vilfredo Pareto found a law i.e., 80-20 law.

Origin

The law can find its roots in the year 1906. Pareto was working on finding the explanation to the economic disparities in the world. His theory had many takers and backed by various experts of that era. One of them was Dr Juran who observed that it can be applied not only to any particular field of study but also in general.

Meaning

This 80-20 rule lays the emphasis on the lesser of anything. It says that the greater of anything is the least important. As his findings states that there is a small group (20%) who owns a major share (80%) of world’s wealth. As per the law, the most significant are less in quantity. And what is in ample amount is the most insignificant.

Detailed Analysis

The time and the task management ensure that the theory fit perfectly in any condition. The stress is on the need to manage the few. This significant part would ensure the attainment of the larger part. This could be well interpretive in the super star theory. According to which efforts must be directed to manage the 20% to achieve 80%.

Steps To Adopt the Theory

This law of time and energy management can be applied in day-to-day life also. The understated points have to be taken into account:

1) Avoiding Useless Tasks:

The most important part of management is to avoid tasks that take toll of time. This would not hamper him/her to concentrate on the most sort-after activities.

2) Foresight:

While planning, the tasks must be selected diligently so as to ensure secure future returns. As today’s solutions have definite impact on tomorrow’s outcome.

3) Keep an Eye on Highly Valued Task:

The overall efforts must be streamlined in order to concentrate on the most important 20%. If one works in this way over a period of time, the outcome would be beneficial.

Time management works on this 80-20 principle. This, in the long run ensures the efforts and time are consumed rightly working on the most important 20%. If this aspect is taken care of wisely, the efforts would definitely prove fruitful.