Hughs Blog

I’ll have more time soon…

Psychologists tell us that we tend to regret what we didn’t do more than what we did do, but that didn’t go well. For example, we regret not taking tango lessons, not opening that coffee shop at that killer location or not learning how to cook Thai dishes more than the guitar lessons that didn’t end up turning you into Jessie Cook.

It’s no different with our use of time. We regret not taking more family trips, not exercising more, reading more, whatever. So, it seems the trick to avoiding more regret in life is to simply do more of what you want to do! Regardless of whether it will be 100% successful, we need to just keep doing what we think will be good for us (didn’t someone once say “Better to try and not succeed, than to never try at all.”?).

Many people in our time management workshops complain of having “no time for themselves in a day”, or “it’s impossible to find even 10 minutes in the day for doing project work”. My question to them is “what have you tried doing differently?”. If a definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, then this is…insane!

Even if your new approach to your time is not completely successful, at least you will learn what doesn’t work. And, more likely, you will actually see some success in your new attempt that you can hang onto and duplicate in the future.

Recently a senior manager happily reported to the leadership workshop class I was leading that he had finally taken five minutes to clear the clutter off his desk. “I felt the stress level drop by half!” he said excitedly. “It only took five minutes and it was a huge change!”.

When it comes to time management there are hundreds of techniques that you can try on for size:

• Find one low-value activity and either: stop doing it (and see if the world stops rotating), give it to someone else, or have it outsourced.
• Put every piece of paper on your desk that you know you haven’t touched in weeks into a box. Label the box with the date a month from now and put it out of sight. One month from now throw out anything in the box you have not required in the last month (the last time I did this, everything in the box got chucked!).
• Take one morning this week and stay off the email completely and work on projects.
• Put a sign on your door that says “I am working on my Boulders. I will be happy to see you after 11:00. Have a great morning!”. Close your door and go to work.
• For one week don’t take any work home. If you need to, stay a few minutes late.
• Turn your cell phone off once you leave the office.
  Don’t check email from home for one week (especially on weekends!)

How to avoid regret? Just keep trying new approaches to old problems and see what sticks!.

Tags: culver