photo credit: jimbowen0306
When I mention the names Napoleon, Lincoln, Einstein, Aristotle, and Darwin, you instantly recognize who I am talking about, and what field they were in. We often hear about the wonderful thinking that people like Socrates or Aristotle brought to humanity. What we don’t tend to hear about is how they interacted with people who were wasting their time as they were rising in academic stature. You can be certain that the most intelligent or financially successful people of all time wasted minimal amounts of time dealing with people who didn’t supplement their studies or business plans. If you want to be remarkable like they were, you will want to act the way they did.
People We Remember Always Guarded Their Time
During these individuals’ lives, including the time when they were teenagers and 20-somethings, their personalities were as full of ambition as the older versions of them that we know about and remember. If you can’t imagine Socrates spending an hour on a trivial verbal argument, it would be beneficial to follow in his hypothetical footsteps by not doing so yourself. The only foolproof way to win a verbal argument is to stay out of it, and you can be certain that any well-known person from the past or present took this route the majority of the time. Save the very few arguments you have to be made with people of a high position or stature, in the process of defending something important to you.
Keep Your Time For Things That Provide Rewards
Randy Pausch, in his Last Lecture, pointed out something to the effect of “no one cares if you clean the dust on the underside of a bookshelf”. He was trying to explain that if you focus on items with very little return-on-investment, day in and day out, there will be no returns in the future as the investment would be minimal. If you routinely perform some menial task that doesn’t bring you long-term growth, reassess whether you can do it less often, or if it is even worth your time to do it.
See The Path As Your Path To Make
People like Napoleon and Abraham Lincoln are remembered mostly for what they did later in life, but since personality and ambition don’t change much during one’s life, it is valuable to take note of how they must have been when they were younger. These were the types of individuals that wouldn’t take no for an answer, not by arguing until they got their way and wasting time, but by pursuing the same desire through a different path or method where their success could shine through. Just as it is very difficult to get a minute of time with President Obama, any of these leaders necessarily made certain to not let their time elapse without high relevance behind what they were doing. Abraham Lincoln wouldn’t have been able to fail so many times on his way to success if he didn’t set blocks of time to put days of effort into each risk, where resulting failure still provided experience.
You Can Turn Probabilities To Your Favor
If you have the ambition to rise up like these individuals, you have to start long before some “luck” arrives. I often point out that personality and response mechanisms are fairly fixed in place for each person through their various stages of growth, anytime after the teenage period is passed. Although the ambition in your personality may be lacking as compared with how you would like to view yourself, you can fill in part of the gap with constant reminders that leave you less susceptible to your own lack of ambition. It is often asked whether the chicken or egg came first. For becoming an individual well-known for pursuing a passion, highly valuing your own time comes before others value it as highly.
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{ 23 comments… read them below or add one }
I think the first important lessons anyone with good time management skills got is how important time is. If you add every minute of every day, that’s your life. Nothing more, nothing less. Realizing time is your fundamental resource gives you the motivation to use your time effectively, in ways which are valuable to you. And this is the starting point to good time management.
Eduard
Ideas With A Kick´s last blog ..Your ability to smoothly handle hearing ‘No’ is crucial
Twitter: eduardezeanu
Hi Eduard.
Those words are good to think of. Those minutes add up to make all that we know of. Some of us sure benefit from reminding ourselves of this regularly.
You are right that understanding the value of it is key to then planning how to use it or protect it. A foundation has to be built before anything can be placed on it.
Twitter: Armen
Hi Armen, staying out of an argument is a good example of not wasting time. When you get into an argument, you have already set yourself up to waste time by wanting to win an argument when the opponent will do everything he or she can to stop you from doing so. We have to be conscious of these situations. That’s why we should model successful people and their characteristic traits like the ones you have mentioned.
Hulbert´s last blog ..Identifying Worst Possible Scenarios
Hi Hulbert.
That’s a valid point there. Arguments are a loss-loss scenario. Even when you win, you lost your time for the win. It’s not the kind of setup a return-on-investment banker would be interested in.
Imagine Socrates arguing for 2 hours with someone about some trivial issue – I can’t imagine it.
Twitter: Armen
Time is such an important resource for me. I say resource because it is not infinite and can definitely be wasted. And once spent it is gone. It’s a lot like money. More and more I am treating time like money which means I am focusing on major/key things I want to do with my time as an investment in myself. That means I am pretty focused on where I spend my efforts. If something gets in the way of that which is less important (menial as you say) that means it’s a poor investment. If my interactions or expenditure on activities are not focused on key activities it tells me it is a poor investment (similar to being a poor financial investment). It’s amazing how people will protect their money but not their time. But actually they are very much the same thing.
Marc Winitz´s last blog ..My Breath as a Weapon
Twitter: marcwinitz
Hi Marc.
It sure is not infinite. This is a good thing to think of, as other items can be created or acquired, but we can’t acquire more minutes.
It sounds like a smart move that you are treating time more like money, and vice versa. Some say acting that way is more robotic or capitalistic, but others really that it shows an understanding of what we have, what we are limited in, and what we are not limited in.
It’s sort of like we pretend we have time in our wallet, and wouldn’t spend it on random activities that don’t fit with our plans.
Twitter: Armen
This guide is a great reminder for us who are living in the Age of Distraction. Too much ‘twittering,’ ‘facebooking’ and other activities that we think are part of our business. But they are really time wasters. We need discipline more than ever!
Twitter: mightyrasing
Hi Mighty.
This sure is the age of distraction. More options and opportunities has turned into 50 ways to lose focus from whatever it is that you want to be doing. It takes someone with an understanding of the loss of value and time in accepting distractions to avoid these time-stealers.
Self-discipline and boldness are my two keyword/phrases.
Twitter: Armen
If there’s one thing I regret in my life, that is the many times I have wasted on things that have never been beneficial to me. I dream, I brood, I worry and I procrastinate. Late did I realize that it has brought me nothing. Now, every second I treat as precious.
Hi Walter.
I can feel you on this point. There is a strong message in what you say. Those little things we run to are garbage. We have to label them as garbage, and see what is a valid use of our time, and return to a thought process like the one you present here whenever we start to get sidetracked.
Twitter: Armen
Armen: This post makes a real good point. We really do need to monitor and manage what we are paying attention to. Some things are helping us move in the direction we desire and some are not allowing us to get out of our own way. I read somewhere that if we really want the higher things in life, we have to deny the lower things the right to our attention. Great post and point. Thanks for sharing.
Sibyl – alternaview´s last blog ..How to Immediately Get in a Better Mood…(especially when you are just having a so-so day or someone has upset you)
Hi Sibyl.
Thanks about the post. I can agree with that about denying the lower things. Even if lower things are beneficial, they have to be denied to allow time for the more valuable things that we would actually rather be doing. We have to accept the loss of some of the smaller actions we have been taking.
At first, we always think we can keep both the small and big things, but slowly realize that we have to cut out the small before we can get control of the big.
Twitter: Armen
This reminds me of an email sent to me the other day on what Jim Rohn was talking about with regards to TV. He was saying the wealthy people rarely watch TV. Whereas poorer people spend a lot of time watching TV. You may buy a TV for $500 but the true cost will be something more like $50,000.
You’re right time is ultimately precious!
Amit Sodha – The Power Of Choice´s last blog ..Honouring People And Cultures With Language Skills
Hi Amit.
That is a true point Jim Rohn mentioned. We can’t output when we are inputting, and TV is also one of the low levels of input. Our brains show very little activity when watching TV, to the point where it seems like we’re almost sleeping.
That true cost of a TV is only for the thoughtful to calculate.
Twitter: Armen
Great point about TV…love it! It’s the great killer of civic engagement!
Twitter: anxietysupport
Hi Armen,
Great article! I love this quote, “No one cares if you clean the dust on the underside of a bookshelf”.”
Suddenly I was reminded about my working habits and it is time for me to stick to the 80/20 principle and start focusing on things that are important. Thanks for the great reminder Armen.
Cheers,
Vincent
Vincent´s last blog ..5 Personal Finance Lessons I Had Picked Up From Warren Buffett That Can Help You Grow Your Wealth and Be Rich
Hi Vincent.
Thanks about the article. That quote sure does resonate, when thought about. I have done many things that are similar to dusting the underside of a bookshelf, and I might as well have been pushing against a wall. I can have big productivity plans for pushing against a wall, and plan my time for using most of it to push against a wall, but I won’t get anything out of all that effort.
Cool deal about reminding of the 80/20 item for what fits you.
Twitter: Armen
Napoleon…do you mean Hill or Bonaparte? I guess either still applies.
Hi Thanh.
Actually, I was referring to Bonaparte there, but Mr. Hill could also fit in, although not as many folks know of him. He sure was prolific, though.
Good point to bring up there.
That makes me want to bring up an unrelated point I have sort of brought up before. As prolific as Napoleon Hill was, there are certainly people out there that have read everything he has published. We have to remember that there is no limit to how prolific we can be, and someone somewhere will always appreciate it.
Twitter: Armen
Totally agree with this. I’ve had this problem recently. Some people will get annoyed but forget them. Go after the greater good, they’ll get over it.
Richard | RichardShelmerdine.com´s last blog ..Lessons From a Month of Meditation
Hi Richard.
This is true about forgetting them, or at least not letting them be a barricade in your way. They will adjust at their own pace.
Also, you’re indirectly helping them by representing an example of managing your own time.
Twitter: Armen
Interesting post that makes a good point – if people or situations fail to meet your personal goals, why include them in your life (unless circumstances force you to)? I like how you put “luck” in quotes. Few people who did better later in life were “lucky.” They had been trying and failing their entire lives, and finally, they found the winning combination that worked for them, and some of them rose to incredibly high levels! They had to ditch people and things that held them back, and while that can upset people…oh well! Many people are simply roadblocks to progress, preferring the safety of the known. The quicker they are dropped, the better.
Dan | anxietysupportnetwork.com’s last blog Should I Seek Individual Counseling?
Twitter: anxietysupport
Hey Dan.
Thanks about the post. I like that you took notice of that “luck” mention, because it is pretty tough to talk about luck like it is some important factor. Probability is of its own accord, and it isn’t something to attribute any value to. Whenever I see “luck”, I see that right before it, in the vast majority of cases, there was effort put out by the person involved that put them in a position for probabilities to already be in their favor by a large margin.
I just read the rest of your comment and we are on the same page.
Also, once in a while, people are testing us, in order to see if we have things we stand for.
Twitter: Armen