Tag: Time

CategoriesActionThink About ItTime

A Stitch In Time

Posted on February 16, 2020

A favourite saying of mine is, “A stitch in time, saves nine”. I liked proverbs, and useful little sayings, when I was younger and I like them even more now.

Through the years I have seen how often they can be usefully applied. This one is easy to remember so it’s great for kids. My children know this proverb all too well. I only ever need to say the first half anymore and they know what I am talking about.

It is such a great saying with a visual thrown in. I can imagine someone sitting and fixing a coat or shirt with one stitch now, to save having to do nine stitches later when there is a bigger problem. You save time, it is likely to look better with one stitch rather than nine, you save resources (eight fewer stitches) and you feel better for nipping it in the bud too!

I often use this in a pre-mortem way. I like to see what stitch I can do now, which might save me time, resources, etc. later. For example, “If I can leave earlier, say by 06:00, I can drop the post in the post box, get to the gym, pick up the groceries on the way back and still be heading to the client meeting by 08:15”.

Of course, you can certainly see the benefit when you do a post-mortem on something too. Here’s an example. “Oh, if I had only left home when I said I would, then I wouldn’t be in this traffic jam, I could have made it to the gym, but now I’ll have to go at the end of the day, miss time with the kids and shower twice. At least I got the essential groceries, though I’ll have to go back out again later for the rest.”

Another common example is missing a payment for something like a class, your car, mobile bill, rent or a mortgage. It is always a much bigger deal trying to undo the damage, than if we had just sorted it correctly in the first place. With a little better forward planning we can achieve this ideal habit. The stress it saves will be significant.

You can find opportunities to use this proverb with just about anything: Health and fitness, finances (savings and taxes), relationships, career, etc.

Think about what needs a little stitch now, to help things go smoother or stop things from getting worse. Keep your eye out today for one or two ways you could use this proverb to your advantage. Then use the stitch and pocket the other eight. Good job.

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CategoriesGoals, Results & New ThinkingReframe your thoughtsTime

New Beginnings

Posted on January 31, 2020

Setting off in a new direction can be both exciting and intimidating. The future could bring untold opportunity or challenges.

Regardless of what is to come, or how the change has come about, or whether you wanted the change or not, the best thing you can do is to take a deep breath, stand tall, smile and go forward, with an open mind and the confidence that things tend to work out well for those looking for things to work out well.

We can focus on the past, the “what could have been’s“, the plans you had, etc., but that is over now and new paths are to be forged. Allow yourself 5 minutes to mourn your loss, and not more, because every minute of life is too precious to dwell on unavailable paths.

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CategoriesReframe your thoughtsTime

Measuring Time

Posted on January 25, 2020

How you measure or calculate time will give a useful indication of your respect for time and whether it will be your ally or adversary.

Do you measure time to get somewhere based on your best ever journey? Worst? Median journey time? Do you include the time it takes to put on your shoes and coat, walk to the car, get the sat-nav ready with the address, find parking, walk to the location, pass security, wait for and ride the lift/elevator and be in a queue at the reception desk? Or do you just measure A to B time and then wonder why you are often several minutes late.

When you sign up for a course that is three hours long every Thursday for four weeks, do you think that it is just 12 hours of your time committed? Or do you realise, and factor in, that it is maybe 17-20 hours more (pre course prep, travel each week – both ways, review notes, prep for test, arrive early and chats at the end), making it about 30 hours in total of time allocation?

And when you add the course into your life for four weeks, do you also subtract out about 30 hours of something that is already there? You will have to sacrifice something in order to allow space for the course. You may sacrifice time with friends, time eating, time at work, time with your family, time with tv or other (social?) media, or time sleeping – which, to be fairly realistic, this is usually the first casualty of more.

People tend not to give as much thought to what they will be removing from their life as they do to what they will be adding in to their life. This one little observation is, I believe, one of the key reasons many people can’t stick to a New Years resolution. It’s unsustainable to add almost 7 hours a week to your schedule without subtracting 7 hours as well. After several weeks of trying to cram the usual activities, plus something more, into a 24 hour period, and a seven day week, usually we start to get sleep deprived, exhausted or ill, and we try to revert back to how it was without the more.

So next time you are looking for something new to add into your life, prime yourself for success: make sure you remove something which requires a similar amount of time (but not sleep). You’ll feel better for it, keep your commitment for a longer time and maybe find that the other activity wasn’t really bringing enough joy to your life to keep it in there anyway.

If you found this post, about time, to be usefully thought provoking, I suggest you also have a look at The Thrill of Being Early.

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CategoriesFinancialThink About It

Investment Returns v Time

Posted on January 18, 2020

I find it fascinating that there are so many different ways to calculate financial returns. Some people look at returns differently.

From gross yield to infinite returns, IRR, ROCE, ROE, ROI etc.

ROI, or Return On Investment, comes up often, especially in property conversations, which is something we spend a fair bit of time having.

But very few people discuss ROTI, or Return On Time Invested.

You might consider time when you start a new job and wonder, is this worth my time. Your salary and benefits would be your return on your time invested at a job. Though, if you were told the job would be 35 hours a week and you regularly work 70 hours, your ROTI would be half what you thought it would be.

If you are an entrepreneur, your ROTI can be a little discouraging in the first couple of years as you might work very long hours while planting the seeds for your business, and not getting much back in return.

As you don’t know how much time you’ll have in this life, before it’s all over, and you can’t get any more of it, you are best to allocate or spend every minute wisely.

By the way, your returns don’t have to be measured strictly in financial terms when measuring ROTI. The returns you get might be the joy of spending great moments with your family, spouse, kids, parents, friends, etc.

So when you consider your financial return on investment, also consider your ROTI. What you may have to give up in time, to achieve certain returns, may not make the investment worthwhile.

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