“I’d love to X, Y and Z,” we say, “but I just don’t have the time.”
Lack of time has to be the most commonly used excuses for why we don’t workout; eat well; have hobbies; see friends and family; clear out the spare room. Furthermore, it’s often used to justify why we still don’t have the body, job and life, that we claim so loudly to be seeking.
Yesterday, I wrote about time and why it really isn’t anywhere near as important as the daily actions that you take. With that said, we still need the time to take this action. In an increasingly ‘busy’ world, where the boundaries between home and work have become very blurred, we need to make a conscious effort to make time for the things that are really important.
Looking to make more time for a new habit, routine or hobby? Try these 3 tips below:
- Combine habits: this might mean squatting as you brush your teeth, prepping the following day’s lunch as you cook tonight’s dinner, or catching up on an audio-book from the bathtub. If you’re doing something that doesn’t require much attention, especially if it’s something repeated daily, it’s just good sense to throw something else in and double your success.
- Get up early: though setting your alarm 20 minutes earlier might feel painful at first, you’ll soon get used to it. There’s something magical about being awake when the rest of the world isn’t. This sacred morning time is perfect for workouts, meal prep, goal-setting, writing and whatever else takes your fancy. It’s totally worth the short-term discomfort of the early rise: it just makes such a difference to the course of your day.
- Treat your minutes like a bank account: You have 1440 minutes in every day.
Do you spend them wisely? How many minutes are wasted on automatic activities that you don’t even realise you’re engaged in? Are you consciously spending minutes on things that actually aren’t doing you any good? Observe yourself for just one average day, preferably making notes, and look to see where there’s time spent unwisely. If you find that you’re watching the news every morning and it’s only making you depressed; or your auto-pilot keeps reaching for Facebook; then the first step is awareness. Treat your minutes like they’re money, and start looking to save it wherever possible. You’ll soon find that you have more time for the things you’ve been putting off – the things that might actually improve your life for the better.
Just to warn you, ‘not having enough time’ isn’t going to cut it anymore. So unless you find another excuse, you’re actually going to have to take action and do all of these brilliant (and maybe difficult, uncomfortable and even terrifying) things that you know you need to do.
Do you struggle to find time to achieve goals? Can you see moments in your day that could be cut out? Would you be willing to squat through teeth-brushing? Any ideas and comments appreciated:
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