Episode 1008: Stop Lying About Your Time

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1008 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:06] Stacy Henry: I'm Stacy Henry owner and coach at center branch, where we grow great leaders. 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 treasures to live out your car.

[00:00:27] Having the ability to deal well with change is key. And one way to be inspired to do this is still listen to this. The inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott.

[00:00:39] Scott Maderer: you'll see those patterns and seeing this honestly is really the first step towards being more productive, towards getting the things done that you really need to get done, because the truth is until we know what we're doing, it's impossible to change because. We're going [00:01:00] to lie to ourselves. Welcome.

[00:01:02] And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. 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 who will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can.

[00:01:26] The word

[00:01:27] and today's episode about developing your influence by stewarding your time. I talk with you about why we often lie to ourselves about how we use our time. I share a quick exercise. You can do to see the truth. And I also talk about why it's hard to be honest, but it's the first step in improving your product.

[00:01:47] 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 [00:02:00] 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.

[00:02:06] Just that quick. If you enjoy the show, when you are ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/. One of those things I've discovered in working with a lot of people, whether they're small business owners, whether they're somebody who's working for themselves or somebody who's working for someone else.

[00:02:26] Whether they're just really somebody that is trying to get something going is that we often lie to ourselves about how we use our time. We talk about being too busy. We talk about not having time to do the things that we really want. We think about how long it takes us to do certain things, but the problem is often our perception of that.

[00:02:51] And the reality of that are dramatic. Different. We think of ourselves as not having enough time to work on that [00:03:00] business that we really want to get started. We think of ourselves as not having enough time to spend the time and energy working on something that we really feel is important. Maybe even we don't have enough time to spend time building relationships or spending time with our family or friends.

[00:03:20] And yet the truth is often we have plenty of time. It's just that we're using a lot of that time in a way that doesn't get us what we really want. That if we really sat down and examined how we're using our time, we would discover a lot of time that we're spending, doing things are pursuing things, are acting on things that really aren't important to us.

[00:03:46] And aren't getting us where we want to do. And by the way, this isn't about that hustle mentality of work 24 7 stay up 17 hours straight and just work the whole time. Never take any time for yourself. Never spend any [00:04:00] time doing anything fun, never waste time, watching TV or reading a book or anything else.

[00:04:05] This instead is about just being honest with where are you spending your time? And then thinking about it, examining it, and sometimes spending a little more time doing the things that are going to get you the long-term goals that you want, and a little less time doing other things that maybe aren't really that important.

[00:04:27] A simple exercise you can do to start seeing the truth of this. Just take a sheet of paper or an Excel spreadsheet or something like that. And put 30 minute increments on it. Every 30 minutes then set a timer on your phone or on your watch to just give a little ring or a little vibration every 30 minutes to remind you.

[00:04:48] And every 30 minutes. A minute or so, and jot down on that 30 minute time slot, what are some of the things you did? What are the things that, that you spent the majority of the time [00:05:00] on? Was it reading emails? Was it watching a Netflix show? Was it spending some time on. A project that you need to work on.

[00:05:08] Was it actually doing some of your work for your day job? What was it that you spent those 30 minutes on you don't necessarily have to capture every single thing, but capture the biggest ones, capture the majority of them do that for three days, four days, maybe even a week. And you would be shocked.

[00:05:29] At how much time you will discover you're spending doing things that you really don't even realize that you're doing. You will be shocked at how many hours in a given week you spend doing things that when you really think about it, you're like, why am I even giving this much time? To this thing, whatever it is, you also will get some eye-openers about how much time it actually takes to do some mundane tasks that maybe the truth is [00:06:00] you need to spend some energy, getting them more efficient.

[00:06:04] Finding ways to do them quicker because right now they're taking you a long time, but they really don't have to. You'll start to see some patterns to what's going on in your time. When are your peak times where it's really easy to get work done and what are your valleys, where your brain and your body are tired and it's harder.

[00:06:23] You'll see those patterns and seeing this honestly, Is really the first step towards being more productive, towards getting the things done that you really need to get done, because the truth is until we know what we're doing, it's impossible to change because we're going to lie to ourselves. We're going to tell ourselves I just need to sit here on the couch for a couple of minutes and vege out, and then I'll work on that project I need to work on.

[00:06:54] And the next thing three hours have gone by. And that project is now waiting for [00:07:00] tomorrow. You're going to discover how sometimes you're staying up too late and you're sleeping in too late and you're not getting the things done because you've been crashing because you stayed up all week.

[00:07:14] Later than you should have. You didn't have the discipline to have a good bedtime routine and a good morning routine. It gets yourself started and stop. You're going to discover that perhaps you're missing a work startup routine. And so it takes you an hour and a half to get started at the beginning of the day.

[00:07:31] And therefore you're not getting things done that you should have gotten done. You're going to see where you're spending your time and where you're not. And where you're spending your energy and where you're not. And with that pattern, you can then begin to decide on what changes you need to make and begin to put in some time and some energy on making those changes.

[00:07:56] But the first step is awareness. The first step of [00:08:00] any change is awareness. You have to stop lying to yourself about how you use your time and to do that. You have to capture. How you really spend your time. And then once you've done that, then you can begin to make changes. Thanks for listening.

[00:08:20] 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. 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 by going to inspired stewardship.com/time or texting 4 4, 2, 2, 2.

[00:08:55] Time tips, and that'll get you our best tips [00:09:00] on stewarding your time until next time, invest your time, your talent and your treasures. Develop your influence and impact the world.