Monday, February 26, 2007

Time Management 101


If you're bipolar you're gonna have to learn time management sooner or later. Like probably as soon as you hit your first hypo/mania. (You probably won't need it when you're depressed because the scarce resource in these phases is energy, not usually time. "so many chores, so little energy")

But on the Ups you got loadsa energy, and loadsa phenomenal ideas, all begging to be immediately implemented. "so much to do, so little....."

So I've been thinking a bit about time management lately, and it struck me that somewhere we are just going completely wrong. Ask anyone if they've got any special aims (resolutions/goals/wishes/dreams...blah, blah) and they pretty much always have.
"Yeah, I want to travel more... take up jogging...spend more time with my family..."

Step Two: "so why haven't you gotten around to doing them"
Answer (99 times out of a hundred): "I just don't have the time."

"But you're still going to get around to them someday huh?"
Answer (every time a coconut): "yeah, one day, when I get time".

WAKE UP BUSTER! You think you're suddenly going to have time thrown into your hands in the future by some Time Fairy?? NO!!!

But does this mean we just have to give up on our goddam goals? EQUAL NO!

So how do you do it, and why doesn't anyone do it?

Well I'll give you a clue. Time is finite right? (if not - you're taking some kinda schedule 5s that were NOT subscribed by your PDoc). But ask somebody this "What special plans have you got to cut back on other time-consuming activities?"
??
A spectacular silence.

So we're all running around saying "I'm gonna get around to this plan and that plan in the future", but I'm not hearing any body running around saying "I'm gonna be cutting back on this and that."

So either we're totally deluded about the finite nature of time, or else our math sucks. Because it's a zero sum game.

5 comments:

  1. This reminds me of this Buddhist tale:

    A man approached the Blessed One and wanted to have all his philosophical questions answered before he would practice.

    In response, the Buddha said, “It is as if a man had been wounded by a poisoned arrow and when attended to by a physician were to say, ‘I will not allow you to remove this arrow until I have learned the caste, the age, the occupation, the birthplace, and the motivation of the person who wounded me.’ That man would die before having learned all this. In exactly the same way, anyone who should say, ‘I will not follow the teaching of the Blessed One until the Blessed One has explained all the multiform truths of the world’-that person would die before the Buddha had explained all this.”

    -from the Majjhima Nikaya

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  2. Time management is a huge issue around here...I work better under pressure...says she who waits for next mania to do taxes.

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  3. I never have time to waste. That's because I've already wasted it all.

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  4. how true is that...i remember once sorta blurting out the phrase:
    "Look I don't have time to be busy ok?"

    weirdest thing ever.
    got me thinking same thing as you think. difficult with all these meds and work and this and that...but hey i guess i'm making something useful out of my life.

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  5. Single dads learn all about time management once they're allowed to sleep through the night. :-)

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