At this point I am sure you are thinking, “This morning routine sounds great, but you don’t understand, I have way too much to do and don’t have time to do this. It may be great for someone else but it will never work for me.”
If you keep doing what you are doing, then you are right, you will never have time. If you are willing to consider what could be and are willing to look at doing some things differently, then this becomes possible.
We are going to start by giving you some tools that will help establish priorities and focus on what is most important. We will not work on how to get everything done, but rather focus on getting the most important things done and determining what makes it rain. The most vital priorities include time with spouse, family, kids, and hobbies as well as highest organizational priorities. It’s a process to get your life back.
You may be thinking, “This is not possible, it seems too good to be true”. Getting your life back will not be easy and will require work. It will require being open to change, doing things differently, being honest, open minded, and vulnerable. You need to be willing to let things go, try something new, and feel uncomfortable.
If this interests you, the first step is to complete the following exercise.
I was first exposed to this matrix when reading the book and completing a workshop on Steven Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” (1989). It has been very useful for me in keeping vital priorities in perspective.
When we look at where we spend our time it falls in four quadrants. The four quadrants are shown visually in the matrix below and examples of the kind of activities in each quadrant are shown. Being honest in categorizing where you spend your time will begin to identify opportunities to gain back time.
Fill out this matrix every day for the next couple weeks. Take each activity, meeting, phone call, etc., and record activity and time spent in the appropriate quadrant of the matrix. Be honest in thinking about what quadrant this activity falls in when looking at what you believe is most important to you. After you finish a week, add up the time spent in each quadrant. I think you will be shocked by what you find.
As you look at the results start thinking about how to stop doing all activities that are not important to you (Quadrant 3 & 4). Take the time savings and apply that time to activities that are very important.
Remember, anything worth doing will be hard. This is worth doing but will require commitment, open mindedness, and willingness to change.
