STOP letting time manage you (part 2)

Welcome to part 2 of learning how to manage time. Or rather how to stop letting time manage you. If you haven’t read part 1 yet, you can go check that over here.

In part 1 we took a closer look at what it feels like and looks like to let time manage you. A quick rundown, here’s what life looked like for me when I let time manage me.

I get up in the morning, rush around cleaning the house, getting the kids ready for school, getting ready to work, working, getting the kids home and doing their chores, running around making dinner, cleaning up after dinner, working some more, maybe watching a minute of tv, and scrolling social media until nearly time to wake up again. 

You know what’s sad? Most of what I wrote is true, and I left small pockets of time out of my day. Time spent on praying, reading the Bible, taking care of our pets, knitting. So add those to the list too. 

Is it any wonder that I feel exhausted and burnt out? 

Hopefully for part 2 we will stop looking at time as something to be managed at all. Rather, I hope that our mindset can shift to being one that is wrapped up in prioritizing our relationships with Jesus and serving Him faithfully.

Shifting your focus

For me the key has been to shift my focus. The world tells us to look at the time, to be “on time”, “how long will that take”. Here in America we are endlessly scheduling ourselves to be everywhere without enough time to get between places. This causes us to drive too fast, eat in our cars, and never pause to enjoy that sunset …

Because we’re already running late!

In fact, we are alway identifying ourselves with time we are “early”, “just on time”, “a little late”, “super late”.

We spend our work hours in meetings watching the time tick by waiting for that sweet moment when we get to join the rest of America in their cars driving home.

If you have the luxury of working from home, or you’re like me and a work addict, maybe you watch the clock in fear – how many minutes are left before I have to stop work?!?! It’s not enough time.

There’s never enough time!

Because time is finite. And so are we.

And since I am finite, and my time is finite, what do I actually, truly, deeply desire to do with time?

How to manage my finite self in finite time

When I started thinking about how I wanted to live, and what things are worth using up this finite time, I sat down and made a list. Of course! I thought about the things that are important.

If my relationship with God is priority number one, then shouldn’t my time reflect that? Etc. Here’s my list.

Then I went deeper still.

Habits show your heart (and shape it too!)

David Matthis says in his article “How your habits show and shape your heart” on theGospelCoalition.org “But our habits not only show our hearts, but shape them as well. It is true, that just like time can end up managing us, so can our habits.

I recommend you go and read his article, it’s so good! And you will see how our habits not only show where our hearts are, but also can shape our hearts.

And this is why rather than following a spreadsheet of seven 24-hour day broken into 15 minute segments, I decided to not worry about time. Instead I will work on my heart. On my habits.

God is so good, right?

It was right around this time that I was making these decisions that I stumbled upon a podcast by The Habit which was a replay from 2022 with Justin Whitmel Earley about his book The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose in an Age of Distraction.

You guys! God was speaking TO me! He put this in front of me and said, “here it is Lois, here’s the habits all laid out for you. Just follow them.”

And so if you go to The Common Rule website you can see all 8 of the habits. Four are daily and four are weekly. And I didn’t feel like they were too much to manage. So, I’ve got my “God habits” locked and loaded.

Picking the habits I want to shape my heart

I feel like I could go on all day about my other habits. And perhaps I will in another post if you are interested. But truly, very truly, my ability to succeed or fail in a day is completely dependent on the Common Rule Habit practice.

If I wake up and turn to my phone, or start rushing around to start my day, I will be a mess the whole day. But when I get up, drop to my knees in prayer and then spend time reading God’s word. I have peace, clarity, and strength to face the rest of the day.

What do you think? Do you have some tips to share? Or want to hear more about my other habits? Leave me a note in the comments below.