Busy, Busy, Busy

We are all busy, busy, busy. But what are you busy with? Are you truly busy or just not using your time the way you want to be using your time? Listen to learn about tracking your time, your priorities, and a few tips to help get your time back under control.

Podcast Transcript

Welcome back to the Something Better, My Darling podcast. I am here to help women find their purpose without compromising their values, and ultimately reach their full potential. Whether you are struggling with self worth, confidence, or lack of taking action, this is for you!  I am so excited you are here! I can’t wait to get to know you!

In my last podcast I talked about words. I should have included the word busy. Ha! Busy is becoming a word to me that means nothing. Think about when you ask someone how they are doing. I would like to bet that 9 times out of 10 they will say, “good, but busy.” Or if someone has not talked to you in a while or you haven’t seen someone, they’ll say, “Sorry, I’ve just been so busy.” I am not trying to say that people aren’t busy. We are, but, and I have to be careful here, I sometimes really wonder what that ‘busy’ is. If you tell me you are swamped at work, but then sit by my desk and talk to me for 40 minutes, ummm…. You can’t really be that busy. Or if you say you don’t have time to get x,y, or z done on the weekends, but then tell me all about the series you binge watched on Netflix, I will question your ‘busy.’ To me it is not about being busy, it is about how you are choosing to use your time. We all have items, tasks, jobs we have to do, but in our free time, how are you choosing to use your time?

I have a challenge for you. If you are feeling like you are too busy to read that book, to take that course, or do whatever it is you’ve been wanting to do, let’s track your time. Yes, I do a lot of tracking, planning, and monitoring, but it is what holds me accountable on so many things! Start paying attention to how much time you spend on your phone, watching TV, complaining about being busy, etc… I am not telling you that you can’t ever sit down and relax and watch your show. I am simply asking you to look at how you spend your time differently. 

In this mix of tracking your time and being busy also comes your priorities. You will make time for your priorities…usually. As you are tracking your time, make a list of your priorities and see how they are fitting in. I would argue that if you aren’t making time for your ‘priority’ then it really isn’t a priority at all. You might WANT it to be a priority, but it currently isn’t. 

I dated this guy for a while who was always so busy that he would forget to text or call, yet he would have time to post pictures to Instagram. I clearly was not a priority in his world, and….we are no longer together. Call me crazy, but I’d like to be a priority to the person I am dating. LOL. 

Back to the tracking and your priorities. Maybe you want to list your priorities first and then start tracking your time. Don’t change anything at first, just track. After a week you can look at your time and reallocate. Budgeting your time isn’t any different than budgeting your money. You need to track it to see where it is spent before you can make cuts or additions. And doing this isn’t always easy. You might have to give up an hour of mindless Instagram scrolling or TikTok watching, but think about how great it will feel to finally finish that book, or to have enough time to get in a quick workout. 

This will also likely mean you have to say ‘no’ to someone or something. I know, I completely understand. I just had to do this today and it was very hard for me, because I didn’t want to disappoint this person. But at the end of the day, I have to be protective of my time and use it wisely. I am not saying this person or event wasn’t important, the event was just not a priority for me right now. 

There are a couple of quick tips that I want to give you that might help with this process too. You’ve listed your priorities, tracked your time, and identified where you can make the changes, or where you can swap time for all of the great stuff you want to get done. In doing this, you will be changing a habit, which we all know can be hard to break. There are many books out there about breaking habits if you struggle with habits. I actually just finished one called, “Badass Habits,” but Jen Sincero. She gives valuable ideas in there as well! For the purpose of your time and not being ‘too busy,’ here are two tips for you. 

1. This first one is something I have recently started to do. In a recent “School of Greatness” with Lewis Howes podcast (I love a great podcast and this is my favorite right now!)He was interviewing Mel Robbins. Mel was talking about how she was in a bad spot with her marriage, career, everything and could barely pull herself out of bed in the morning. She will admittedly say that this next part sounds silly, but she saw a commercial with a rocket launch and she thought to herself, that is what I am going to do tomorrow. I am going to launch out of bed like a rocket. So the next morning when she woke up, she counted down 5-4-3-2-1 and got out of bed. She was amazed it worked! Since this first day of her rocket launch she has discovered there is a science behind the time your brain tells you to something and you actually taking action. Turns out, it is 5 seconds. So if you think about doing something, but wait longer than 5 seconds to do it, chances are you won’t do it. All of this to say…in breaking the habit of not getting out of bed, putting down the remote, picking up a book, give yourself the countdown 5-4-3-2-1 and GO!!! I have found this to be especially helpful in situations where I don’t like to do something. Asking my kids to brush their teeth. LOL. I know it will probably start a lovely debate on why they need to brush their teeth, but the faster they are done, the faster they are in bed, which means I can go to bed! Or what about making that call to the dentist, doctor, financial planner, whomever, but tomorrow always seems like a better option. Why? Do it now – 5-4-3-2-1! 
2. Set a timer. I realize you might feel like you are in grade school to do this, but how often have you said, “time just got away from me?” All the time! I say it too! I actually just looked at the clock and thought that. Hahaha! For my miracle mornings, I often have to set a timer or I will keep praying, keep reading, keep…. And then run out of time for my last part, which is exercise. So if you are working on a task, but you know you won’t finish it, or if you want to look at Facebook for just 5 minutes. Set a timer. And guess what, when it goes off…5-4-3-2-1 put down your phone. 

I hope those two tips help you and you can start using them today! To recap. 

1. Write down your priorities for how you’d like to spend your time
2. Track your time for a 3-5 days
3. Identify where you can make changes / swaps for your time
4. Use 5-4-3-2-1 and setting a timer to help manage your time and take action

One more challenge for you. Stop saying you’re too busy. Yes, you might have a lot of things you are trying to accomplish, but these are within your control. You get to choose what you do and don’t do. So if you are too busy to do what is important to you, what your priorities are…start tracking your time and make some changes. 

Maybe you are ready to take this journey and start taking massive action to reach your potential or you could be trying to decide. Either way, I am so excited to have you here! My soul is on fire to help you! If you’d like to join me on a journey, visit somethingbettermydarling.com and click on ‘give me 40 days!’ to sign up for a summer or fall journey! Connect with me on Instagram or Facebook at Something Better, My Darling, or if you’d like to see me and my kiddos and fur baby, you can find me at Mandi Lanae! This is Something Better, My Darling. Thank you for listening. Make today great, my darlings!