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Episode 643: Do You Spend Time in Isolation?

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Join us today for an episode about the reason you need a community...

Today's episode is focused on spending time in community and isolation...

In today’s episode about investing in others by stewarding your time, I talk with you about the good of spending some time alone, why this isn’t all good, and why you need to find a community to also invest time in.

Join in on the Chat below.

00:00:00 Thanks for joining me on episode 643 of the inspired stewardship podcast. I'm Scott Brookens from Scott Brooklyn's dot com. I encourage you to find the way to be inspired, to start your dream business and find freedom. And one way to do that is to be inspired by this the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Mader, Because the truth is none of us have the true answers to life,
00:00:35 the universe and everything. And hopefully some of you get the reference, the book that that's from, but in truth, we don't, we don't know the secrets to the life, the universe and everything. Instead, what we have to do is walk together on this journey in community, doing the best we can with the imperfect knowledge that we have. Welcome.
00:00:56 And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcasts. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling and the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world In today's episode about investing in others.
00:01:28 By stewarding your time. I talk with you about the good of spending time alone. I also share some reasons why, even if you're an introvert, this isn't all good. And I share why you need to find a community that you can also invest time in. As we talk about stewarding your time. Wouldn't it be great if you could support this podcast and do it without just taking too long,
00:01:53 it turns out you can't. All you have to do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission will come back to support the show. Just that quick. If you enjoy the show, when you are ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon Alone time. I need some quality time with myself.
00:02:20 I need some me time. You, you hear people say these things all the time about how they, they need some time in their own head. They need some time to spend with themselves. They need some time away from the crowd away from other people away from the hustle and the bustle and the noise that sometimes comes around from being surrounded by people.
00:02:43 You know, maybe if you've got a job where you interact with people all day long, when you get home, you need a little bit of time and space to yourself before you plug in and jump in and begin to spend time with your family. Needing alone. Time is a real thing. Needy. Some quality time with yourself is a real thing.
00:03:05 And by the way, this is true. Whether you're an introvert or an extrovert. Now the difference is extroverts definitely begin to want to spend time with others more rapidly. That happens to recharge their batteries for them and helps them get their energy level back up. If they spend time surrounded by people that that tends to charge them up, as opposed to drain their energy.
00:03:29 We're an introvert spending time with a whole bunch of other people tends to drain them. They begin to get tired and need some time alone to recharge their batteries, but both introverts and extroverts need alone time and need time with others. Those, those needs are the same for all people. We, we just need them in different doses and different amounts, and we need different controls around them.
00:03:59 You know, the extrovert can kind of have, they can have people put upon them suddenly and unexpectedly, and it doesn't bother them with an introvert that can feel like a huge imposition that can feel like something that has drained their energy and wiped them out. It isn't all good to spend time alone because the truth is all of us as human beings, we are social animals.
00:04:27 We, we need to be surrounded by other people. We, we are people that has grown up in community. One of the differences though, that nowadays on the communities that we're surrounded with tend to be a lot larger than they used to be used to. We would be plugged in with a relatively small network of people and we would spend our entire lives with them and we would know them well.
00:04:53 Now we often are plugged into much larger networks that are more distributed and it's hard to get to know everybody and trust everybody. So it's definitely good to spend time alone, but it isn't all good. It can't be all you do. And right now, of course, for a lot of us, we've been isolating ourselves physically from other people for months and months at this point.
00:05:18 And we've discovered that we miss that community. We miss those people. We miss being able to plug in with other people and physically be in the room together and break bread together and do all of the other things that we do together. We miss our communities. And if you're feeling that then right now becomes even more important to avail yourself of the tools that we have to invest time in other communities and not just so that they can lift you up and pour into you,
00:05:52 but so that you can pour into them. You need to find communities that you serve and find communities that serve you both are important to our healthy development as human beings. One of the things that people don't like about social media is the way that, you know, one person hates Facebook because it controls the news and the next person hates Facebook because everything that's on there is fake and they don't do enough to control the news.
00:06:22 Oftentimes we surround ourselves with people that think just like us and we're in this huge echo chamber of information where the only thing that ever comes back to us is things that already reinforce our beliefs and our biases. And that's not good when I'm talking about community recognize I'm not talking about a group that is uniform, but I am talking about a group that has unity.
00:06:48 And these are two different things. If you surround yourself by uniformity, then everyone believes like you, everyone looks like you. Everyone sounds like you, everyone has had the similar experiences as you. And that can be very comforting. It feels comfortable because you recognize everyone's journey. You identify with them, you, you feel like you fit in and they fit with you.
00:07:12 Now I'm actually challenging you to find a community that is diverse, a community where not everyone looks like you. Not everyone sounds like you, not everyone has the same experiences you, that some of the people have a different race or different sex or different creed. Some of them believe politically differently than you do. And then learn to be able to have conversations and listen to other people's experiences that broadens your mind,
00:07:44 that opens your eyes to things that right now I guarantee you are blind to, and you don't even know you're blind. You're the blind man walking along, not able to see and not even aware of our own blindness. Trust me, I do this too. There were things that I believe I know there are things that I believe that aren't true, but I believe them because they're so deeply embedded in who I am,
00:08:08 that I'm blind to the fact that they're false. But what we have to do is challenge each other to reach out across barriers. If you're white, to reach out to blacks that are hurting right now, if you're conservative to reach out to liberals and listen to their viewpoint, if you're liberal to open your mind and your eyes and your hearts to conservatives,
00:08:36 if you believe very strongly that in something, anything, even, even something that's, you know, maybe some people would believe as a conspiracy theory, you still have to reach out and open your eyes to others. And the possibility that you may be wrong because the truth is none of us have the true answers to life, the universe and everything. And hopefully some of you get the reference,
00:09:04 the book that that's from, but in truth, we don't, we don't know the secrets to the life, the universe and everything. Instead, what we have to do is walk together on this journey in community, doing the best we can with the imperfect knowledge that we have, and hopefully getting better each and every day. But the only way to do that is to surround ourself with community.
00:09:29 That is you, that is United in wanting to grow together and to be truly beneficial, it's United, but it can't be a uniform community. It can't all be the same. And trust me, that is challenging. It hurts. There are days where that hurts. It feels painful. It feels like your reality is being confronted and things are uprooting who you really are.
00:09:57 But as you reform in that community, into new people, what you discover is a strength that you never even knew existed. Thanks for listening. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast, as a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling.
00:10:33 If you like this episode on the stewardship of time, be sure to sign up for our stewardship of time tips series, by going to inspired stewardship.com/time or texting four, four, two, two, two time tips. And that'll get you our best tips on stewarding your time until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures, develop your influence and impact the world.


In today's episode, I talk with you about:

  • The good of spending some time alone... 
  • Why this isn’t all good...
  •  Why you need to find a community to also invest time in....
  • and more.....

We allow or ignorance to prevail upon us and make us think we can survive alone, alone in patches, alone in groups, alone in races, even alone in genders. - Maya Angelou

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Some of the Resources recommended in this episode:

I make a commission for purchases made through the following link.

Let Me Know What you Think Below....

Episode 638: Dunning-Kruger and Time

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Join us today for an episode about the way the Dunning-Kruger effect messes with time...

Today's episode is focused on why you need to understand this bias when planning your time....

In today’s episode about investing in yourself by stewarding your time, I talk with you about the Dunning-Kruger effect and what it is.  I also share how this affects your planning and day and how you use your time.  I also share some tips on what you can do about it.

Join in on the Chat below.

00:00:00 Thanks for joining me on episode 638 of the inspired stewardship podcast. I'm Rob burger, author of retire before mom and dad. I encourage you to find your own journey to true financial freedom. And one way to be inspired to do that is by listening to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Mader. But to do that, you have to be willing to be open to being challenged.
00:00:32 You have to be what I would call coachable. You have to have the ability to allow disparate thoughts to come into your head. If you're closed minded and assume that everything you know is right, and that you are the expert in all things, then by definition, you are a walking example of the Dunning Kruger effect. Welcome, and thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast.
00:00:59 If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true color. In the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world. In today's episode about investing in yourself by stewarding your time.
00:01:27 I talk with you about the cognitive bias called the Dunning Kruger effect. I share how this affects your planning and your time management and how you view the day. And I give you some tips about what you can do about it as we talk about stewarding your time. Wouldn't it be great if you could support this podcast and do it without just taking too long,
00:01:49 it turns out you can't. All you have to do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission, we'll come back to support the show just that quick. If you enjoy the show, when you are ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. You know, there are a lot of ways that our brains are wired.
00:02:16 Our cognitive biases, things that we're designed are made and the way our brain works and thinks about things actually interferes with our ability to do well and succeed. And one of those biases is called the Dunning Kruger effect. Hey, Ron mentioned it on Monday's episode. And basically what this says is this effect is a bias where you wrongly overestimate your knowledge or ability in a specific area.
00:02:47 And it tends to happen because of a lack of self awareness that prevents you from accurately assessing your skills. You know, this, this idea goes back the late nineties where these psychologists, Dunning and Kruger, it's two different people. We're studying how people ascribed their own skill. And what they found out is when they did independent testing of skills and ranked people so that there were people that were above average people that were average,
00:03:18 and that were people that were below average, the people in the lowest grouping of skill ranked themselves to be above average and skill over 60% of them said that they were above average. And this idea that when we're low at a skill level, we think of ourselves as experts is a well known effect. And the truth is that having sort of confidence and having the ability to think,
00:03:49 you know, I can do this is one of those things that gets us up and going in the day. It's one of those things that causes us to, to succeed in many ways, but it also is a blind spot at times. And by the way, it can happen to you. Even if you are an expert in one field, you may have the Dunning Kruger takeover in other fields,
00:04:11 you know, have you ever noticed how on Facebook people that are one minute they're constitutional law scholars and the next minute they're epidemiologist and the next minute they're experts in national politics and the next they're experts in world politics and the next they're experts in astronomy and astrophysics and medicine and hell. The point is all of us tend to think of ourselves as experts and above average and knowledge across a wide variety of areas in less.
00:04:42 You recognize the fact that your experience and skill in one area generally do not transfer to others. You can't recognize your own competence and the level of ability and less. You can step outside of yourself and look at what you're doing objectively. And what's interesting is as you begin to learn about a topic, then when you get past a certain point, you recognize the fact of how little you actually know.
00:05:15 And so experts in an area actually have a tendency to underestimate their ability to know Dunning Kruger has kind of a double curse because it causes you to perform poorly in an area. And then it actually causes you to not recognize that you're performing poorly in an area. This has a, an effect on our planning and our day to day. Because oftentimes when we're thinking about doing things,
00:05:46 if it's something that we're doing for the first time, or we've only done once or twice, we very quickly begin to overestimate our own ability. We think that things are going to go better than they are. We think the day's going, gonna just perfectly lay itself out and everything's gonna fall into place. And we're going to have this perfect ideal day and we'll get everything on our list done,
00:06:08 and nothing will hold us back. And we don't leave any sort of room for things to go wrong. We don't leave any room for mistakes. We don't leave any room for the fact that that task that you thought was going to take you. 30 minutes is probably going to take you three to five times that if it's the first time you're doing it,
00:06:28 the truth is that this effect rares, its ugly head. When we plan our day, it rears its ugly head. When we look at our goals and think about all of the things we want to accomplish, because if we're trying to do goals in a new area for trying to plan time in a new area, one where we don't have expertise, then we generally overestimate our own ability and underestimate how long it's going to take us.
00:06:56 This is one of the reasons that one of the time management techniques they'll tell you is to estimate how long a new task is going to take you and then multiply that time by three, four or five. And that's the amount of time you actually want to allow for it. Now, again, this is true for a new task. If you're truly have become an expert in a particular task,
00:07:16 then it's much easier for you to say this is how long that's going to take. But that takes time. That takes experience that takes doing the same task over and over again, to develop that routine. When you're doing something new, doing it for the first time, you want to recognize the fact that you're going to underestimate your ability. You're going to think that you're better at something than you are.
00:07:40 That is what this effect does. Some of the things you can do, obviously you can change how you estimate time, but you also can recognize that you have to play your own devil's advocate. You have to plan against your own biases rather than blindly accepting them. Challenge your own conclusions, challenge your own thinking. Look for your blind spots by asking for other's opinions.
00:08:07 This is one of the reasons that outside accountability around time can help us manage it. Because if you feel a hundred percent confident, having someone from outside, look at it and be somebody who asks challenging questions, it makes you step back and think about it can be very, very helpful to allow you to reset and refocus and then actually put a more accurate estimation of your ability and your time into place.
00:08:36 But to do that, you have to be willing to be open to being challenged. You have to be what I would call coachable. You have to have the ability to allow disparate thoughts to come into your head. If you're closed minded and assume that everything you know is right and that you are the expert in all things, then by definition, you are a walking example of the Dunning Kruger effect,
00:09:04 and that will not allow you to succeed in using your time. Well, no matter what, thanks for listening. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you like this episode on the stewardship of time,
00:09:37 be sure to sign up for our stewardship of time tips series, by going to inspired stewardship.com/time or texting four four, two, two, two time tips. And that'll get you our best tips on stewarding your time until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures, develop your influence and impact the world.


In today's episode, I talk with you about:

  • The Dunning-Kruger effect and what it is...
  • How this affects your planning and day and how you use your time...
  • Some tips on what you can do about it....
  • and more.....

One of the painful things about our time is that those who feel certainty are stupid, and those with any imagination and understanding are filled with doubt and indecision. – Bertrand Russell

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Some of the Resources recommended in this episode:

I make a commission for purchases made through the following link.

Let Me Know What you Think Below....

Episode 633: Recognizing Your Habit Triggers

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Join us today for an episode about the reason the triggers are the key to habits...

Today's episode is focused on identifying your habit triggers...

In today’s episode about impacting the world by stewarding your time, I talk with you about recognizing your current habit triggers recognizing them.  I also share why hijacking current triggers for new habits is a key to changing habits.  I also share why without recognizing your triggers you won’t break your bad habits.

Join in on the Chat below.

00:00:00 Welcome to episode 633 of the inspired stewardship podcast. I'm Robert Farrington from the college investor.com. I encourage you to be inspired, to become a better steward through financial wisdom. By listening to this show, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Mader, And what you'll find out is over time. You'll begin to replace that old bad habit with a new and improved good habit.
00:00:40 You do that consistently, and you just examine habit after habit after habit. And over time, you'll begin to build a whole new routine and it's that 1% improvement each and every day. That truly leads to growth and success. Welcome, and thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcasts. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be,
00:01:06 then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true color. In the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world. In today's episode about impacting the world by stewarding your time. I talk with you about why recognizing your current habit triggers and hijacking those current triggers to form new habits is so important and why without actually recognizing triggers,
00:01:44 you won't break your bad habits or form new ones. As we talk about stewarding your time. Wouldn't it be great if you could support this podcast and do it without just taking too long, it turns out you can't. All you have to do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission will come back to support the show.
00:02:07 Just that quick. If you enjoy the show, when you are ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. Let's talk about habits. You know, the truth is one of the biggest reasons that I noticed that people struggle with their time and what their productivity is because of habits, both good ones and bad ones. See the truth is we all have literally thousands and thousands of habits that make up our daily routine.
00:02:42 They're often unconscious, too. We don't even think about them as habits. That the truth is what happens is we have something that triggers us that cue, or that trigger sets off a routine or a pattern of behavior in our brain where the neurons fire. And we do something without even really thinking about it. You're, you're just doing it on autopilot.
00:03:06 Have you ever gotten up in the morning on perhaps a day off and you get ready for work, you get dressed, you do everything you get in the car and you drive to work. Even though in your head, you knew you were supposed to be driving to the airport or to somewhere else. You know, you had a day off and yet just by automatic triggers when the pattern happened,
00:03:28 when the alarm clock went off at the same time that it normally does. You executed a long series of different things, some of which are quite complex, like driving to work. And yet all of it was triggered by that first alarm into this cascade of habits or routines that caused you to go about your business and end up in the wrong place. You know,
00:03:52 life is filled with all of these opportunities and all of these different things around us. And yet many of us end up doing over and over and over the same thing we always do. And sometimes that's a good thing. And sometimes it's a bad thing. You know, the truth is that the trigger, the cue for a habit, the fancy definition for it is it's an event that kicks off the automatic urge to complete a habit.
00:04:23 It's the thing that starts the pattern because it creates the firing in your brain. The truth is if you can disrupt triggers or hijack triggers or recognize triggers, then you can both break old bad habits and form new good habits. Deliberately triggers are the key to reprogramming our habits. And it's simple as point a trigger and a habit pattern is if X then Y if the trigger happens,
00:04:56 then do the habit behavior. You can actually write them down. And that way you probably already have things. If the morning alarm goes off at 9:00 AM, get out of bed, it's already happening that way. Then I get out of bed. I get dressed. I brush my teeth a whole series and patterns of one habit after the next is triggered by that initial alarm.
00:05:21 And the truth is if you notice triggers that are very specific, they're, they're clear, they're unambiguous, they're consistent. They happen each and every single day, or with some sort of reliable frequency. If they're automatic. In other words, they have it without they happen without any impact from you without any, uh, doing anything yourself and they're unavoidable.
00:05:44 There's something that you can't ignore. Usually for most of us, those habits fall in the category of a proceeding event. Something happens that triggers the next it's a beginning list, but it can also be time. Like certain times of the day. It can be emotional triggers, like feelings, things that are going on inside your own head. It could be location.
00:06:07 Like when I sit down at my desk, then I do this. So for instance, I have a dedicated place. That's my workplace. And I try very hard to keep that for work. That's an, a location type of trigger. Emotional States by the way, are really good for replacing bad habits with some sort of good recovery habit. A recovery habit is anything that you do that helps you feel better,
00:06:32 but is it something you would regret? So, unfortunately, a lot of times with an emotional trigger, our normal recovery habits are things like go get some ice cream, which is great, unless you're trying to lose weight. And then you can replace that with things like gratitude, take a walk journaling, but it can be difficult to do that at times,
00:06:52 but that's one of the ways you can hijack a bad habit. Even other people can be triggers. Think about it. You probably have certain people that when you run into them, y'all do certain things. That's using people as a trigger. All of these sorts of triggers trigger their own responses. When you start thinking that way, you begin to notice things that you do each and every day.
00:07:17 Think about what happens right before it think about your emotional state. Think about the location that you're at and the time of day, and try to figure out which one or ones of those things are triggering the habit. And then what's interesting is you can begin to substitute a new then a new behavior for the existing behavior. So if a certain thing triggers you to turn on Netflix and binge Netflix for an hour,
00:07:43 you can replace that with reading a book. It takes time. It's not easy, but over time, you'll begin to break the bad habit and replace it with a new habit. And you can even use a habit to trigger another habit. So for instance, brushing your teeth can be the trigger that then causes you to do something else like meditate for 10 minutes.
00:08:08 If you are already got a consistent routine of always brushing your teeth in the evening or in the morning, then that habit can be the trigger for the next habit like meditation. If that's something you're trying to add into your life. So the, the process of doing this first examine the triggers of your current habits, think about which of those habits or things you want to change.
00:08:32 Try to think about new triggers that you can put in place a trigger. How can it be more specific? Can it be more consistent? Can it be more automatic? Can it be less avoidable, find the triggers and then hang off of that, a new habit, a new behavior, write down the habit that you're trying to do. Write it as an if then statement,
00:08:54 if this happens, then I'm going to do that and then begin to practice that. And what you'll find out is over time, you'll begin to replace that old bad habit with a new and improved good habit. You do that consistently. And you just examine habit after habit after habit. And over time, you'll begin to build a whole new routine and it's that 1% improvement each and every day.
00:09:21 That truly leads to growth and success. Thanks for listening. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast, as a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you like this episode on the stewardship of time, be sure to sign up for our stewardship of time tips series,
00:09:57 by going to inspired stewardship.com/time or texting four, four, two, two, two time tips, and that'll get you our best tips on stewarding your time until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures, develop your influence and impact the world.


In today's episode, I talk with you about:

  • Recognizing your current habit triggers... 
  • Hijacking current triggers for new habits...
  • Why without recognizing your triggers you won’t break your bad habits....
  • and more.....

The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken. ― Samuel Johnson

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Some of the Resources recommended in this episode:

I make a commission for purchases made through the following link.

Let Me Know What you Think Below....

Episode 628: 15 Minutes Towards Self-Development

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Join us today for an episode about the key to self-development...

Today's episode is focused on finding the time to grow...

In today’s episode about developing your influence by stewarding your time, I talk with you about how even 15 minutes a day can help you master any skill, how to find 15 minutes a day, and how this will increase you 1% each day which is the goal.

Join in on the Chat below.

00:00:00 Thanks for joining me on episode 628 of the inspired stewardship podcast. I'm Bob melodic from seed time, and I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent and your treasure to live out your calling, having the ability to grow your money. Like a seed is key to learning.
00:00:21 God's way of handling money in one way to be inspired to do that as they'll listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott Mader, He, his question is how do you find that 15 minutes a day? What do you carve out of your life and turn into 15 minutes a day? And the truth is you, you first need to think about where are you going to put it?
00:00:50 You know, for a lot of us, the learning time needs to be first thing in the morning, because if we leave it for last thing at night, we're so tired and frustrated and enough things go wrong during the day. Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcasts. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be,
00:01:11 then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true call in the inspired stewardship podcast. You will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can In today's episode about developing your influence by stewarding your time. I talk with you about how even 15 minutes a day can help you master any skill,
00:01:42 how to find that 15 minutes in a day and how this can increase your growth 1% every single day, which really should be the goal. As we talk about stewarding your time. Wouldn't it be great if you could support this podcast and do it without just taking too long, it turns out you can. All you have to do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon.
00:02:07 When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission will come back to support the show. Just that quick. If you enjoy the show, when you are ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. The truth is if you want to be in a different place in six months and three months in a year in three years from now,
00:02:32 you have to think about your mindset when it comes to growth and self development, you know, over and over again, I coach people. And one of the things that I see over and over again is people talking about how they just don't have time to learn new skills. They just don't have time to study. They just don't have time to exercise.
00:02:53 They just don't have time to do some sort of personal growth routine or each and every day. They struggle with putting in place a routine. They struggle and putting in place a constant self-development habit. And the truth is that you are who you create yourself to be. You have to change yourself and your thinking. If you want to be in a different place than you are today,
00:03:25 if you want to grow, if you want to succeed, then you have to know yourself and you have to work to develop those positive habits. As you design yourself, by designing your day, you design your future because the habits that you go through today are what create your future. Personal development is so vital and so important. And yet all too often,
00:03:55 we leave that last. I talked to people about how they set aside, time for development. And usually the reason they say they have no time is because it's the last thing on their list. It's the last thing they get to. They don't make a habit of learning and growth. And instead they put that last on the list. See the truth is if you have a time problem,
00:04:23 you really don't have a time problem. You have a priority problem. You have the same amount of time as everyone else, but where you put your priorities is what creates what you do. So the truth is with as little as 15 minutes a day, you can begin to master any skill. Let let's just take reading for a second. Let's say you want to read,
00:04:50 and let's say you read Oh, 300 words a minute, which is really slow, but that's doable. That's that's about a half a page, you know, in normal book every minute. So if you read 300 words a minute that you would read about 4,500 words in 15 minutes, and at the average book is between 50 and 60,000 words. That means you could finish a book in about 13 days.
00:05:22 That means just in a normal month, you should be able to read two books, reading as little as 15 minutes a day. And it doesn't work just for reading. If you want to listen to podcast episodes, you can listen to those. Listening to those for 15 minutes a day begins to teach you a new skill or watching educational videos on Skillshare or YouTube or one of the other learning platforms that's out there.
00:05:52 See it's the truth is we live in a world today where we are by opportunities to gather knowledge. We're surrounded by information. If anything, there's almost too much information out there, but you can begin to study it in 15 minutes a day. And you would be amazed at how much you would learn in a month and then do that month in and month out.
00:06:19 And it compounds over time. This allows you to begin to grow yourself just a little bit each and every day. See, that's one of the big problems that people have. They sit down and they try to cram all of their learning into one day. And then they burn themselves out. They get frustrated because change isn't happening fast enough, but it's kind of like watching a child grow.
00:06:45 When you grow up in the same house as a kid and you see them grow, you don't recognize how much they've changed across a year because it's slow and gradual. But whenever a stranger sees them on their birthday and they haven't seen them for a year, they always remark with how much change has happened. The same thing happens to you with this kind of incremental growth.
00:07:08 So the obvious question is how do you find that 15 minutes a day? What do you carve out of your life and turn into 15 minutes a day? And, and the truth is you, you first need to think about where are you going to put it? You know, for a lot of us, the learning time needs to be first thing in the morning,
00:07:26 because if we leave it for last thing at night, we're so tired and frustrated and enough things go wrong during the day that we never actually spend our time doing it. And we can't develop a habit without doing it as a routine. So I recommend for most people trying to put that 15 minutes of learning time, first thing in the morning, you get up,
00:07:47 you get a cup of coffee, you sit down on the front porch or on the couch somewhere quiet. And you just set your alarm an extra 15 minutes early to give yourself that time. So you don't have to rush and get to work and be frustrated and feel like you're running behind. If you've got young kids at home, get up before the kids get up.
00:08:06 If at all possible, this is a good time for not just exercise and physical growth, not just Bible reading and spiritual growth, but actual intellectual learning as well. Now, if that doesn't work for you, if the morning just isn't a good time for you, then find another time, take an extra 15 minutes of your lunch break, pack your lunch and read that book while you're eating your lunch at your desk or outside,
00:08:35 you don't have to extend your, your lunch break time. You can still do it in the same hour, but take 15 minutes of it each and every day as your learning time, or if that's not going to work for you, cut out watching one TV show for half an hour. That gives you two 15 minute blocks. You know, the average sitcom is 30 minutes long.
00:08:56 So just skip watching this sitcom each night. But you know, of course, if you do that in the evening, in the afternoon, like I said, for most of us, that's the time of the day that it's the easiest to let slip. And that's why lunch and morning is often better, but you can find 15 minutes a day. If you make it a priority,
00:09:16 see that's the key. You have to decide that learning and growth is important to you. And then you can allow that habit to develop. If you need help with that, if you want some, some other suggestions, if you need someone to hold you accountable to it, reach out to me. I'd be happy to hold you accountable to your own growth.
00:09:37 Thanks for listening. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you like this episode on the stewardship of time, be sure to sign up for our stewardship of time tips series,
00:10:08 by going to inspired stewardship dot Calm slash time Or texting four, four, two, two, two time tips. And that'll get you our best tips on stewarding your time until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures, develop your influence and impact the world.


In today's episode, I talk with you about:

  • How even 15 minutes a day can help you master any skill...  
  • How to find 15 minutes a day...
  • How this will increase you 1% each day which is the goal....
  • and more.....

Each day you must choose, the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. - Eric Mangini

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