Too busy?? Tuesday Night Tunes

By Jerry Robertson 2013-08-06 Tuesday Night Tunes

I hear it all the time. “I am really busy!!” or “I just can’t seem to get ahead”. Well, we all have some choices and I can tell you from my perspective, it’s hard. I want to do it all and it is apparent that I can’t. We have to choose because if we don’t we are not going to get done the really important things in life. We will be a slave to our email inbox or the text messages that come in at 9pm asking us to do just ‘one more thing’.

So what do we do? For me, I usually start looking for answer in a book. Sometimes it’s the Bible. I found these verses at the Open Bible site and I think they are good at giving us some direction. One I liked a lot was Ephesians 5:15 ESV “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise”. Check out the others if you like but I am going to run with that one for now.

So, being wise in our use of time. I read another book called 18 Minutes by Peter Bregman. Seemed like a good book and it gave me some tips on using time better. In the theme of Tuesday Night Tunes, I decided that this one fit the idea at least in principle.

Iron Butterfly, In a Gadda Da Vida runs 17 minutes and 5 seconds so it is right in there. Check it out.

More to the point of the book, it was important to take some time and figure out what areas in life are important, what are your goals in them and are the things you are saying “Yes” fit in the plan to get you to your goals. The easiest way to have more time and not be as busy is to say “No” more but you have to say no to the right things.

Five area in life I try to break things down into are Spiritual, Family, Business, Financial and Personal. It’s not exactly what Bergman did but it makes sense to me so I do it that way. Find what makes sense to you.

In each area I have a goal or goals and beyond that try to figure out what to say NO to and what to say YES to. There was a time that a good friend of mine challenged me that I was doing too much. Too many things that spread me too thin and I could not do any of them well. (Thanks Chris). It changed a lot of things for me and I do my best to make sure I have some margin in my days.

Bergman suggested that 5 minutes in the morning, 5 minutes in the afternoon to review what you are going to do and what you did were a good start. The other 8 minutes were each spent at the top of each hour to see if you are on track. Simple but not easy.

Two of my areas (Family and Personal) are being addressed partly by working out and / or walking with Susan at least 5 days a week. Susan and I are starting a new schedule this week because of a job change for her. She used to be at work at 6:30 and we had most of the afternoon free once she got off work at 2:45 to go walk or work out with Celeste. Now she does not get off work until 4:15 so we have to do that stuff in the morning. Sooooo. I am getting up at 6am. At least that is the plan. I’ve done it twice so far <smile>.

If you want to chat about this stuff, I am glad to meet up with you. With a little notice coffee or lunch works most days so give me a call or email me. I love to talk about goals and share how it helps us.

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Thanks for listening,

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