Time-Keeping Tips: How to Take Control of Your Most Precious Asset
In 2024, you need to own your time.
Question!
How many times in the last year have you said yes and committed to doing something that you secretly didn’t want to do?
You only said yes to be polite, because you felt it was the right thing to do or because you didn’t know how to say no.
Right – more times than you’d like to admit!
This year, you need to take back control of your time.
Time is your most valuable asset
It doesn’t matter how much you work, how healthy you are or how many times you win the lottery… Time will still be your most valuable asset.
You cannot make or buy any more of it, and it is always running out.
Sure, if you make a lot of money, you can work less and have more time for yourself.
But, at the end of the day, you can’t BUY more time.
That’s why time is your most valuable asset.
You should be even more frugal with your time than your money.
You should not waste it on anyone.
You need to own your time.
Learn to say no
The best way to take control of and own your time is to say no when needed.
You don’t want to be a complete jerk and say no to your loved ones who need you, but you should learn to say no to things that you don’t want to do.
Saying no is a superpower.
It’s the ultimate superpower and the closest thing you can do to buying time.
Think of it this way…
Every time you say yes to someone, you are saying no to someone or something else.
If you say yes to going to the hockey game when you hate hockey - you are saying no to spending time with your family or working on a project you love.
Saying no to the right things means you can now say yes to the things you love.
Saying no gives you more control of your time.
Learn to say yes
As you practice saying no, you want to learn to say yes too.
If you are constantly saying no, there is a good chance you will never get to experience anything exceptional. You may end up eliminating the joy out of life and kill your potential.
That’s why you also need to learn to say yes.
Say yes to new experiences.
Say yes to adventures.
Say yes to spending time with loved ones.
And say yes to anything you are comfortable saying yes to.
When you are lying on your deathbed, there is a good chance you will have regrets. Those regrets often are not taking more risks, going on adventures and not spending more time with loved ones.
Taking control of your time also means saying yes to life.
There is no point in having time if you aren’t even living your life.
What do you value the most?
People rarely take the time to think about what means the most to them. They’re too distracted by their routines or the things that they feel like they have to do.
They’re so distracted that they forget to spend time on what they actually care about.
Don’t let this happen to you!
Every once in a while, you should take the time to go through your values, rank them and then prioritize them accordingly.
Quite often, you’ll realize that your time has been spent on all the wrong things.
Tony Robbins in his book “Awaken The Giant Within” talks about having main values. This is a great starting point for you to use to evaluate how your time is spent.
Health
Family
Freedom
Finances
Creativity
Happiness
Generosity
Relationship
There are more potential values than just these. That is where your self-awareness comes in.
Go through your values and rank them in order of priority. You’ll be able to easily determine where you should be spending your time.
For example, if you value creativity the most, you will want to spend time learning instruments, painting, writing or with whatever creative outlet you enjoy the most.
That will be time well spent according to you.
And making your time, time well spent, is what matters most.
To sum it all up
Taking control of your time comes down to having enough self-awareness that you know what to spend time on, and then saying yes and no accordingly.
The issue you’re facing is that you either don’t know what to spend your time on or you don’t know how to say yes and no.
If that is the case, you need to work on your discipline, self-awareness, decision making and confidence.
But, I bet you already know that… right?
Thanks for reading