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Sure, this is definitely not the first time you will hear about the importance of “Time management“, but I guess, this is such an important thing in life, that it cannot hurt to think about it once more.

Time management

The management of time. Time, that is something we always have a lack of, right? And management, well, everything is getting managed these days, don’t you agree? Therefore, sure, why not! Let’s manage our time! It can’t be that difficult!

Oh really? Well, I heard lots of rumors about this topic! Some claim that “time management” is indeed an impossible quest, while others believe in the complete opposite. Whatever you believe in, I guess the following statement might always be right!

We say “time management”, but what we actually mean is the way we spend our time.

Are you a CEO? A “top manager“? Or at least working in the management department? Come on! Why not?

But on a serious note, we do not really manage a lot in our every day life. Sure, we go to work, have our hobbies and sports, visit our friends and stuff, but that’s not really us managing anything, right? That’s just us doing stuff. And if we really think about it, most of the time we have formed a habit of doing it anyways. Our life is simply put based upon routines and habits that dictate our behavior. You think that you have a free will? I highly doubt this statement! You do what you want to do, sure, but why do you want to do it? Why do you want to build a house, travel the world, and do all the other things in life? Because you really want to do it, or because others expect that from you?

But what happens once your life gets out of balance is quite fascinating to watch. Recently, the COVID19 pandemic did exactly that. People were forced to break with their own routines. They couldn’t go to work, to the gym, into their favorite restaurants and stuff.

How well did you do your “time management” back in those days? Was everything fine? Or did you struggle a bit here and there? What have you done with your new gained free time? Something productive? Something you always wanted to do? Or just wasted it with something stupid? Well, you are the manager! You decide what to do with your time, right?

In fact, time is a funny thing! Tick, tack! Do you waste your time? Or do you try to be always productive? In the end, the perspective makes the difference. While for some a 5h racing simulator practice session might sound like a very useful investment of time, others see just a total waste of it.

But sure, todays post is about time management, right? This is not intended to be a nasty attempt to talk about our miserable lives again. We don’t want to think about corona, or suffering, or a lack of something like time. Come on! Corona is long gone, at least if you listen to the strange people that demonstrate in Berlin these days! Have you heard about them? QAnon conspiracy theories and stuff? Really fascinating how people can get “brainwashed” these days! I mean “no front”, everybody can believe in what they want! But honestly, come on guys! You can’t be serious!

But let’s go back to our topic of time management!

One, two, three…

Psssst! Silence! Can you hear it? Tick, tack! One, two, three…! Can you hear it now? The clock is ticking. One second, two seconds, three seconds. It all starts with that! A second can be long, but a second can also be really short. In Motorsport there are sometimes up to 20 cars reaching a lap time after the qualifying that might not differentiate itself by more then just a single second, like you can see every race weekend in the ADAC GT Masters. While in other situations in life we claim afterwards that it went so fast. “It was just a second I did not take attention!” But sure, theoretically a second is just that, a second. A certain amount of time. But to be more precise, a definite amount of time. Added to another, 60 seconds create something we call a “minute“. And 60 of those so called “minutes” create what? Right! An “hour“! And 24 of these create what? Right! A “day“! And 365 “days” in a row? Right again! A “year“! And 80 “years” in a row? Correct as usual! An average life time!

60 seconds * 60 minutes = 3600 seconds/hour
3600 seconds/hour * 24h = 86400 seconds/day
86400 seconds/day * 365 days = 31.536.000 seconds/year
31536000 seconds/year * 80 years = 2.522.880.000 seconds/life

Only 2.522.880.000 seconds, what?

But depending on your age, you might need to adjust this number a bit here and there! Some of your time seems to be already spend! Let’s assume you are 25 years old, just like me! Well, then we need to remove some couple of 788.400.000 seconds already!

Now, I have only 1.734.480.000 seconds left! Uhm, 1.734.479.999 and now at least three seconds less!

“But wait a second!” What? Are you kidding me? That can’t be correct! That’s not enough time! Come on! How am I supposed to do all of what I want to do in just a couple of million seconds? God, please! Give me some more time!

Time management?, well, it’s not really a management thing here, is it?. It’s rather “time distribution“. The clock is always ticking! Tick, tack! One second after the other! You can’t stop it! I can’t stop it! Nobody can stop it! Therefore, what do we do? Use every single second we have? Or do we waste our time with unimportant stuff?

How are we supposed to manage something that we can’t even stop, or at slow down a bit, or at change in any kind of a way?

Is the concept of “Time management” a lie?

No, of course not! It’s not a lie. But sure, its not really “time managing” either! It’s rather time wasting. Just imagine how much time you have already wasted with sleeping!? Unbelievable, right? How are we supposed to do so much stuff when we need to waste so much of it with sleeping? This seems to be unfair!

But time management is of course something else! It’s not primarily the management of time as a whole, but rather the way you spend your time. That people can do a lot, even though their days have not more than 24h either, have people proofed on multiple occasions already. From athletes to entrepreneurs. From musicians to CEO’s. From authors to single parents.

Time management seems to be rather a lifestyle thing than something economical. It’s the way you spend your time. Some do more, others less. In the end, it is always up to you how you spend your time. There is definitely no right or wrong! And therefore, theoretically not even a “waste” of time possible. Without knowing if something will help you in life or not, I guess everything can become useful somehow, it might just depend on your perspective!

Your time on this planet is limited, therefore, I can only highly recommend you to use it wisely!

See you next time!