How is it that we have more tools and technology, Calender’s, Checklist and To-Do list today then ever before, however we are still always behind ?
In this modern world of gadgets & Apps, we still work longer hours and even after knowing more about time management, our stress levels are at an all time high.
Does this really mean that we don’t know how to manage time OR is time management is really a Myth ?
In the last few years, I have done a lot of research on time management and I can certainly say one thing for sure that “time management is a myth”. There is no such thing as time management. I say this because, the seconds in a minute are fixed. The minutes in an hour are fixed. The hours in a day are also fixed. So, when everything is fixed, then where is the scope of managing time ?
The only thing that we can manage are the Task’s that we plan to do during the time available during the entire day (24 Hours).
One of the great time management Guru has laid emphasis on Prioritization of task’s based on Urgency & Importance. Prioritizing is all about focusing first on what matters most. This can also be explained with the help of 80/20 principle, which states that we should focus on those 20% first, which has 80% impact.
Now, there is nothing wrong about prioritization, however prioritization never creates more time. All it does is, it takes item number 5 on your To-Do list and bumps it up to number 1, but it doesn’t do anything by itself to create more time. Also, it does not help us in accomplishing other items in our To-Do list.
So what actually we are doing in prioritization is juggling between different activities and borrowing time from one activity to spend on another activity, but the total time to complete all the activities remains the same. So, now we can say with confidence that there is nothing in this world, which can be termed as “Time Management”.
Remember, we can only do Task management and Self Management. We need to learn to stay to be more disciplined in the way we are spending our time in various task’s and activities. We can never manage time nor we can save it. We are only provided with 24 hours in a day and we must know how to make the best use of that time based on our priorities. The key is in how we use that time. We can use it wisely, or we can waste it, but we can never save it. At the end of the day, it’s gone.
“Ordinary people think merely of spending time, Great people think of using it”.