I want you to prosper and succeed.
This is my lifelike desire for YOU.
But very few people would spend the time reading an article or blog post a day. And even fewer would apply the needful strategies to set themselves apart in the crowded majority.
You see, I am not going to pander to the lowest common denominator. I have made up my mind to write you something valuable daily, if you can’t cope then probably this site is not for you. There are plenty of other sites which can resonate.
As I overload you with information in my posts, i will also show you how you can accomplish more in one week than in all of last year. But also we will kick it up a notch. I’ll show you time-management techniques to digest the flood of life-changing material you’re receiving daily from me.
I’m going to post lots of articles with embedded commands designed to set you up for success. If that’s not cool with you, please unsubscribe or rather please don’t come to my site. I am only interested in people who take inspired action and dare something worthy.
You may say. David, “You don’t get it! I’m in grad school/a busy job/have a girlfriend or family/ etc. I just don’t have enough time for this.”
Before I get into any techniques on making the most out of your extra time each day (and we ALL have extra, whether that’s 30 minutes or 3 hours), I want to make something clear.
Time is as much a mind-set as it is the minutes ticking away as you’re reading this.
Have you ever started profile surfing on Facebook or WhatsApp, only to snap out of it a full 45 minutes later, feeling ever busier and more time-crunched than before?
The fact is we all have time it’s just a matter of actually using it.
How much time are you spending on stuff that doesn’t give you anything back?
You don’t have to spend all your time being “productive” or stop doing the fun, non-work things you love, but just few small changes can make you get more — more money, more rest, whatever — out of the time you do spend.
Everyone complains about time. Doesn’t matter if you’re the CEO of a huge corporate, or a manual worker making $1 an hour. Time affects and constrains everyone, at every stage of the earning ladder.
When time gets tight, it’s not just your spare time that starts to dwindle. Your motivation — the energy you have to do the unsavoury work of executing on your ideas — can be dramatically impacted by your time.
So, be the boss.
When you decide to be a top performer, you’re the boss. You’re the boss of your time, your energy, and how you spend both. So, like a good boss, I want you to start thinking about “time management” as making the most of the resources you have available to get the job done.
Ask yourself:
- How much are you getting out of the time you’re spending?
- How does the Return on Investment (ROI) of a given choice or activity look compared to other ways you could be spending your time?
- Is the time you spend productivity dense? (e.g. a social lunch filled with networking, marketing / pitching, an email or blog writing session where you end up with a template that you can later use over and over again with a little customization)
You can do more with less time
Time Management vs. Energy Optimization
We’ve all heard those stories of leaders, entrepreneurs, moms, all these people who do more than you can imagine with busy, hectic lives. I’ve found that there is one thing they have in common — they don’t manage their time.
These highly leveraged, top performers and extremely effective people, manage
- energy and
- motivation
It’s easy to equate energy and productivity with time — it’s the natural way of thinking of it. Our time obsession comes from the days of the industrial revolution, when people transitioned to factory work and assembly lines — and when their value and productivity started being measured not by RESULTS (as with agriculture, where all that mattered was how much you produced) but by increments of time.
When you’re earning money on the side, and especially if you decide to go or start a freelance full-time, results — not time — are what matter.
But, when you’re trying to earn more and you have too many constraints on your time — or too few — it’s easy to lose sight of your goals, throw up your hands, and give up.
Today’s exercises have 2 objectives:
- You’ll choose your true goal, and road-map it out for the next 12 months.
- You’ll master one golden habit to get more out of the time you spend every day.
4 steps to save 1 hour/day starting this week
What you’ll need:
- Personal Journal
- 1 pen
Step 1: Know what you want/what is your goal?
Don’t skim over this. BE DETAILED. No one else is going to see this, so don’t worry about being “selfish” or having goals that are too “weird.”
I know that you probably don’t know yet exactly what you will be doing for work, but answer to the best of your ability and with as much detail as possible as to what you want to be.
Step 2: Pattern Interrupt
Get up and away from your desk and all screens for 5 minutes. This includes your computer, tv, cell phone, or anything else. We spend a lot of time consuming information, which is exhausting and can kill good idea generation.
The Pattern Interrupt — just 3 minutes — clears your pattern of information consumption (news, Facebook, WhatsApp, email, text messages, etc.) and gives you a new way to look at your skills, strengths, earning ideas, and goals.
This is a critical step that WILL affect your results throughout your life.
Step 3: Craft Your Goal
Now brainstorm a specific goal of where you’ll be in 12 months. BE SPECIFIC. Here’s an example:
Bad: “I want to have a lean fat burning body…”
Better: “In a year from now, I will loss 5kgs making me weigh 60kgs which I will make me be in my normal range of my body mass index.”
Bad: “I want to make more money”
Better: “In a year from now, I will be working 5 extra hours per week as a freelance IT Ghost-writer, I will be making $100.00 per hour which $2000.00 per month”
Step 4: Goal tracking (ongoing at regular intervals)
The point of your goal is to give you a target. I want this to be a target that you actually SEE.
For simple goal tracking, write down or print out your concise 12-month goal and post it on a surface you look at every day:
- Your computer screen
- Refrigerator door
- Bathroom mirror
- Inside door of your bedroom
- Inside your front door
Distractions and pitfalls to avoid
Is it your goal to have more fun? Should you really be spending more time at your job? Focus on what your goal is and ignore what doesn’t track. You don’t have to cut it out of your life, but you do have to ignore it.
If you find that your goal is too vague, here’s a simple way to get to the core of what you really want: The 5-Whys Technique. It works like this.
Let’s say your goal is to quit your job. Why? So that you can be self-employed. Why? So you don’t have to answer to a boss and build value beyond your pay check. Why? So you can choose what projects you work on, and not have to rely solely on income that comes from a pay check. Now you’re getting somewhere.
Remember, the goal is to work backwards and build a clear road map so you don’t have to decide your goals every month. It’s tough to focus on anything with an unclear goal.
I’m asking you to do this because time and time again I’ve seen that it DOES make a difference to write down your commitments and get accountable.
Use these time management techniques to digest the flood of material I’ll be sending you on this site. My hope is you’ll use that extra hour and turn it into something that helps you live a richer life — including finding a profitable idea to earn more money on the side or even working for yourself full-time.
Making the most of your time — and making sure you stay fully motivated is one of the most powerful lessons in life.
To your success!
Shalom and much love
David
