Have You Got the Time?

Time Management Techniques from the Experts

One of the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic is that for the last 14 months or so, time has been very strange. We lost track of what day of the week it was, and eventually many of the weeks and months started to blend together into 10 months of April, 2020.

Now businesses have been opening up and all over the country people are going back to work in the office, going out to bars, and even planning their trip to music festivals. In Los Angeles, everything went practically “back to normal” this week, with people who are fully vaccinated not legally required to wear masks anywhere any more (though specific businesses can still require them if they choose).

Going back to “normal” gives us a chance to re-evaluate how we want to spend our time. Suddenly there are a lot more demands on our time—whether it is the return of our daily commute, or a sudden inundation of our social calendar with all those weddings that were postponed in 2020.

For guidance on how to spend my time in a way that is most likely to increase my happiness, I listened to Dan Harris’ Ten Percent Happier podcast from Jan 25, 2021, where he interviews Ashley Whillans, assistant professor at Harvard Business School, and author of the book, Time Smart. Here’s what I learned:

Do a Time Audit 

In order to be mindful about how you are going to spend your time in the future, you need to first know how you already spend time in the present! One good way to do this is to do a “time audit”. Tuesday has been shown to be the most typical day to monitor, so at the end of the day on Tuesday just write down the main activities from your morning, afternoon, and evening. If you want a broader perspective, do this every Tuesday for a month.

Now make a grid with the most meaningful activities on the horizontal axis and the most pleasurable activities on the vertical axis. The activities that are both meaningful and pleasurable will go in the top right quadrant, and the least meaningful activities will go in the bottom left quadrant. 

Review Your Values

In order to rank your activities according to pleasure and meaning, it is helpful to first take a few minutes to think about your values. Pleasure is easy to identify, but evaluating meaning can be trickier. For example, even if you hate your job right now, it can have a strong meaning for you if it means you can support yourself and be a responsible adult. Low in pleasure but high in meaning. For more on clarifying your values, read this.

Funding Time and Finding Time

Now evaluate all the things that fall into the lower left quadrant—least pleasurable and least meaningful.

Can you delegate or outsource any of these tasks? These are the things that should be first on your list to eliminate if you can. If you are lucky, your partner might enjoy doing those tasks you find less pleasurable, and you can trade some responsibilities. Do you hate cooking but don’t mind kitchen cleanup? It’s okay if one of you always cooks and one of you always cleans the kitchen—tasks don’t always have to be divided 50/50! For some excellent ideas on how to divide up household tasks, read Fair Play, by Eve Rodsky.

Sometimes you can get creative and change the unpleasant, low-in-meaning task so that it takes less of your time. For example: you hate making the bed (low pleasure), and don’t even care if it looks messy all day (low meaning), but your partner complains when you leave it unmade. If you get a comforter with a removable cover you can eliminate top sheets and blankets, and you will be able to make your bed with one swoosh of the comforter in the morning. Or you could re-frame the task of making your bed as something you value, because you value pleasing (and having!) a happy partner. 

Next look to see where you are spending time mindlessly, without really choosing that activity. Generally, this is the category for things like social media and checking your email. Set aside specific times for these activities so that you are consciously choosing to do them, not just responding to notifications. You can plan to check your email just 2 or 3 specific times a day. And when you do, decide how much time you are willing to spend and set an alarm. Be proactive, not reactive!

Social media and messaging systems like email and Slack create what is called “time confetti”, little chunks of time that distract you from the task at hand, and make you feel “time-poor” by creating “goal-conflict”—an uncomfortable state of being where you think you should be doing something other than what you are actually doing.

Research shows that 80% of Americans feel “time-poor”. It’s an easy trap to fall into!

How Has the Pandemic Affected the Way We Spend Our Time at Work?

The pandemic has left us underwhelmed with our options for leisure, and even though we thought we’d have all this extra time due to working from home, the average American is actually spending 49 minutes more per day on work! If you are going to continue to work from home, this is worth examining in your own life. Are you also spending almost one full hour more on work when you work from home? Do you actually want to or need to be doing that?

If not, it’s important to have good boundaries!

Whillans stresses the need to build breaks, boundaries, and transitions into our workday. Part of feeling “time-abundant”, instead of “time-poor”, is to know your own rhythms and respect what feels right to you! If you find yourself with low energy at certain times of day, maybe you would actually gain more energy from a brief nap or a short walk around the neighborhood than you would from that third cup of coffee. An excellent book about how to take advantage of your personal biorhythms is Dan Pink’s When.

Look for casual interactions

Another thing we miss when we are not in the office is those little interactions with random people. Bridget, the receptionist at my office, is such a lovely person! It’s only after going back into the office last week that I realized how much I missed seeing her warm smile when I passed by her desk. Research shows that these informal work interactions with people we know only casually actually bring as much happiness in an average day as a conversation with a close friend or colleague. If you are not going into the office yet, make sure to greet the mail carrier, go for a walk to chat briefly with a neighbor, or say hi to your barista when you go get a cup of coffee!

Take a vacation!

We know that during the pandemic virtually no one was taking a vacation, but did you know that even before the pandemic literally 75% of Americans didn’t take all of their vacation days? Don’t let this be you!! People who take vacations are happier and more engaged at work. And if it’s a struggle for you to get time away, know that research shows that the most relaxing vacations are ones that aren’t very long—only 3-5 days.

In Conclusion

Now that things are going “back to normal” the rhythm of our lives is changing again. We’ve had well over a year to see how some of the things we used to think were so important in our lives, are actually not worth so much of our time. Now is an excellent time to get clear on how we really want to spend our time in a way that expresses our own personal values.

Studies show that people in countries that stress the importance of time with friends and family over work and making money, are happier and mentally healthier during events like recessions and pandemics. You, too, can improve your own mental health by becoming more aware of and more proactive about how you spend your time. Make sure you spend the majority of your time and energy on that important upper right quadrant—activities that are both meaningful and pleasurable.  People who feel “time-abundant” are not only happier, but they also have better relationships, and are at less risk for cardiovascular disease. Taking charge of your time is good for both your mental and your physical health, so get started right away!

Are You Feeling Stressed Out by All the New Demands On Your Time?

Therapy can help you understand why you feel the way you do, and give you tools to manage your emotions and your time. To see how therapy can help you, give me a call at 323-999-1537, or shoot me an email at amy@thrivetherapyla.com to set up your free consultation. I look forward to talking with you soon!