3 Actions to Make Time Your Friend

The most scarce resource that a leader has to manage is time, his or her own, and the time of others. The workplace is driven by time. There are specific hours for starting and ending the workday and for taking breaks, with some having to physically clock in and out. Woe be unto us if we are late. We have specific times for meetings to start, although end times seem to be open resulting in meetings dragging on way “over time”. We have deadlines. By the way, ever wonder why they are “deadlines” and not termed something like “life-lines”, “success-lines” or “completion-lines”? We complain that we don’t have time for this or that, have run out of time or need more time. We seem to be constantly at war with time.

Working from home, virtually over the last year, made us think we would have more time. After all, we don’t have to dress for work anymore, nor commute to and fro, and there is no-one popping into our office for a casual chat, nor a water cooler to hang out at. But after a year, most of us seem to be even more time-strapped than ever.

So we try harder and harder to control time and to get more of it. We attend Time Management courses, read books, schedule our calendars, set timers, start work early and stay late – all to no avail. It seems that the more we try to manage time, the more it manages us.

Can we really manage time? Can we manage something that is totally outside of our control, which ticks on no matter what and will continue long after we are gone? Can we make more of something that is given in equal measure to each of us in terms of hours in the day, minutes in the hour and seconds in the minute? It’s not possible. Why fight a battle that we cannot win? Perhaps it’s time to make peace with time (many thanks to Lama Surya Das for this insight in his book Buddha Standard Time).

How do we do this?

Until recently, I thought that I would slow down and take things easier, and be more orderly after I had completed everything on my “to do” list. But there has rarely been a day, week or month when I accomplished it all. Time always conquered my to do list, leaving my life as collateral damage. Sometime ago I decided to make peace with time.

I stopped.

And then started again at a much slower pace. I discovered that when I slow down, I open space for my priorities to become clear, allowing my energy to flow to these priorities with ease so that I get them done. Then, time feels to me like what it really is – endless.

Here are 3 things that I did and you can do to make peace with time:

1. Spend quiet time each morning in stillness and silence. Even 10 minutes helps you to be grounded and calm. Do this no matter what – even and especially if you are late. Stop “running late” and be still for a few minutes. You can also do this before a ZOOM call – before you logon, sit quietly for 5 minutes.
2. Accept that if you are late, you are late. Don’t rush. Slow down and get wherever you are going calmly and “in due time”. Ever notice that when you rush to be on time you only save a few minutes, even seconds? Slow down and be late. And while you are observing your lateness, reflect on why and what you can do to make sure it doesn’t happen another time.
3. Each morning, scan your “to do” list and identify the ONE most important thing you would like to accomplish on that day. Do it mindfully and with focus and take a moment to congratulate yourself when it’s done. Then you can tackle the next item, and the next, one by one. In no time, you will have completed if not all the items on your list, at least the most important. What a great use of your time!

Since making peace with time, I am getting the important things done, not just “on time” but even early. I am naturally eliminating my time suckers and being more present to life. Time is no longer my enemy, it is my friend.