I’m delighted to have Laura Vanderkam as my guest today.  She’s the author of several books, including her new one, 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think. She puts a new spin on your perspective of time.
 

Be honest. The last time you didn’t want to take on a volunteer commitment – say, running the preschool silent auction – how did you wiggle out? If you’re like most of us, I bet you said “I don’t have time.”

It sounds polite, and no one questions it. Aren’t we all busy these days? And you may have thought it was true.

But I’m trying to use those four words, “I don’t have time,” carefully. Because often, these words become a way of letting power slip out of our hands, and that has unfortunate implications for the rest of our lives. 

Take, for instance, the preschool auction. Try a little thought experiment. What if the person asking you to help out had said, “oh, by the way, we’ve decided to start paying a $50,000 stipend to whoever takes on this difficult task. Do you have time?” I’m guessing you’d decide you would.

Of course, this means that your original answer wasn’t true. If the stakes were high enough, you’d find the time to do the project. But the stakes weren’t that high. So you didn’t. Time had nothing to do with it.

I think this is a better way of thinking about our commitments, and our hours. One of the most inspiring people I interviewed for my new book, 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think, has six kids and a seven-figure business. She also manages to get enough sleep and spend some time smelling the roses. Her secret? As she told me, she recognizes that her time is a choice. And so she doesn’t say “I don’t have time to do X, Y, or Z.” Instead, she uses these words: “I don’t do X, Y, or Z because it’s not a priority.”

Often, that’s a perfectly adequate explanation. I could tell you I’m not going to sew my kids’ Halloween costumes because I don’t have time, but that’s not true. I have 168 hours a week. If someone offered to pay me $100,000 to do this little arts and crafts project, you can bet I’d break out the needle and thread and get started. Since that’s not going to happen, I can acknowledge that I don’t think sewing costumes is as high a priority as, say, working. Or playing with my kids. Or sleeping. No big deal.

But let’s raise the stakes. It requires more courage to “I’m not going to read to you, sweetie, because it’s not a priority.” “I’m not going to think about my long term career plans, because it’s not a priority.” “I’m not going to go to the doctor because my health is not a priority.” Yikes! If it’s true, then it’s true, even if it’s not politically correct. Own that truth. But recognize that these are choices, and not a matter of lacking time. When you say “I don’t have time,” this puts the responsibility on someone else: a boss, a client, your family. Or else it puts the responsibility on some nebulous force: capitalism, society, the monster under the bed.

Regardless, the power slips out of your hands. Better to own up to why you will or won’t do things, and hence be able to fill your time with the things you decide matter.
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Check out Laura Vanderkam’s new book, 168
Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think  and you can also learn more on her blog http://www.my168hours.com/blog.

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