Finding time

A few ideas

 Be pragmatic about things like your house, family and friends.  This links in somewhat to Wendii's point about socialising.  I know a number of people who complain that they don't have enough time but when you look at how they spend their time they are constantly out visiting friends and family every evening or they are obsessively cooking, cleaning or doing DIY.  If that's what's important to you then fair enough, but realise that it's taking time away from other things.  Maybe you don't need to see everyone you know 4 times a week.  Perhaps you don't need to vacuum every room every day.  Possibly you could leave the decor as it is for a year and not repaint throughout everytime you buy a new cushion for the sofa.  Do you really need to cook 3 different dinners everynight for your family of 4?  These are not spurious or hypothetical examples, They are behaviours of people I know, one person I know does all of them.

Similarly be pragmatic about going away on holiday.  I know a lot of people who go away every chance they get usually to the same places, spending a week sat by a pool or on a beach bored out of their skull, or drunk, then come back miserable and, usually, in debt.  Why not try a few days with your feet up on the sofa catching up on that must read pile?  If you do go away perhaps try going somewhere of particular interest to you rather than the same old packaged resort holiday where the only way you can tell if you're in Greece, Florida, Spain or Jamaica is the currency you use to pay for your drinks?

If possible use public transport for all or part of your journey to and from work.  Sure you can listen to a podcast or audio book whilst driving, but your attention is split (and whilst concentrating on one you might miss something important in the other).  If you live and work in a town or city can you take the metro or bus to work?  If you live outside the town or city you work in can you drive to the train/metro station, park securely and take the train/metro the rest of the way?  Alternatively can you car pool with someone who won't be put out by  you reading or listening to podcast as they drive and will do the same when it's your turn to drive.

If doing any written work (whether it be a report for work or an assignment for a continuing professional development course) remember what you learned in school about planning your work.  Spend a little time up front planning the best way to approach to work, structure how you're going to approach it.  Ongoing and continuing professional development (and personal development for that matter) has been important for a long time, are getting more important and doesn't look like it's going to lose importance any time soon.  This is going to include courses leading to qualifications/certifications which are likely to include assignments and reports to be done outside the classroom, indeed with the growth of blended and distance learning more and more of the class will be outside the classroom.  I frequently (pretty much every day) get asked by friends and colleagues to help them with assignments.  The most common issue I've found is that as soon as they are set an assignment they immediately think "Oh God!  I've only got 3 weeks to do this!  I must start working on it now!"  So they start working on it and work on it and work on it, but don't actually plan how they're going to work on it so what they end up with is basically an unstructured mess in a Word file that took them many, many hours to write and now they want me to untangle into something that will get them a good grade.  I usually finish up removing over half of what they wrote.  An hour or less at the start just analysing what the assignemnt is actually about and deciding an approach would have saved us both a lot of time.  I'm getting to the point with some people where I'm thinking of trying telling them that if they want my help with an assignment they must bring it to me before they start working on it so I can help them to analyse the question and plan the approach.  To twist an old saying, an ounce of preparation is worth a pound of cure.

Finally, this brings us to what I think will be the most contentious idea, especially with High-S and High-I people (but High-D/High-C may love it), and that goes totally against the 'Give, give, give" philosophy of networking.  Identify who in your life is a time sink and try to limit contact.  From time to time we all have in our life someone who takes up a lot of our time with their 'troubles' but seems to crash from one disaster to another and never get things sorted out.  I'm not saying ditch your friends when they have problems and definitely not saying to abandion someone who has hit hard times or received devastating news such as a cancer diagnosis.  If a friend has a genuine problem then help them as best you can, give them support and advice as needed and/or a friendly ear and shoulder to cry on if that's needed.  I do not and would never advocate refusing to help when you can.  Unfortunately there are people who seem to always have nothing but problems and never get out of them not matter how much help they get (or once one problemis solved they come up with a new one), often if given advice they won't impkemnt it for no reason or some outlandish reason.  Sometimes this can be a symptom of a mental illness (e.g. Munchausen's or Munchhausen's by proxy,. not that I'm advocating trying to diagnose people, just recognising that sometimes ineffecvtive behaviours can be the result of mental illness), sometimes it's co-dependancy and sometimes it's just that they feel a need for attention and that's the only way they know to get it (e.g. victim mentality).  Help them if you can but remember that, other than your family and, to a lesser degree, your directs, it's not your responsibility to fix their world, certainly not alone.  If they repeatedly refuse to implement suggestions look to gracefully withdraw and limit contact.   This is the one I find hardest to do.

Stephen

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Skype: stephenbooth_uk (Please note I'm on UK time)

DiSC: 6137

Experience is how you avoid failure, failure is what gives you experience.

Finding Time

Any for me? Here are four tips that have helped me:

Add more time earlier to your day: Yes, set your alarm clock 15 minutes earlier and use the extra time to prioritize your day... I have done this and added another 15 minutes every year for the past several. Getting up early and working on having a plan for the day, or starting on that big important project when I am fresh allows me to take more breaks during the normal working day and/or get my work done before quitting time. Those moments then are used for the learning and updating you mention that you are trying to find the time for. As the saying goes, "plan your work, then work your plan."

Use the time you are sleeping more effectively: Have you ever had a day dream that seemed like you were recalling seeing a clip of a movie?  That is probably a recollection of a dream you had the night before. This might seem nuts, but... Ask your self a question as you go to sleep such as, "How can I find more time to read?" You will subconsciously think about that question through the night. Next morning, for the first 5 minutes of your wake time, try to think of nothing... Or later that morning while in the shower or while doing something that requires no thinking (like making coffee or getting the morning paper) recollections and potential answers to your question might just pop in your head. 

Get rid of, or minimize, wasteful tasks, like email: I get ~5,400 emails a month. The worst thing I can do is to go through them one-by-one or give them more priority than they deserve. Limiting their drain on my time like you would limit an invasive plant in your garden helps me have more time for other things.

Go read "Eat that Frog": Brian Tracy has several great other tips, so go get this short read, and put it on top of those other books on your pile. Some of his tips might give you more time for those other books.

http://www.amazon.com/That-Frog-Great-Ways-Procrastinating/dp/1583762027

Know thyself...

I will add only one simple recommendation. Know thyself.

You know when your most productive time is (morning, late afternoon, after lunch, whatever.) Block time for *the* important task in that time slot. Then you and your mind are ready to do an outstanding job quickly and efficiently in the alloted time.

You will feel better and gain momentum for handling the other stuff that comes your way.

Be ruthlessly efficient with

Be ruthlessly efficient with what you read.

Stop reading that book or article that you're not getting enough value from.  You won't get in trouble if you don't finish it.

Other Tips

Get a Kindle and Kindle on your iphone. Allows me to keep reading as I move from train to crowded subway. Also leverage the feature that allows you to mail PDFs to the Kindle for reading.

 www.RobDeichert.com

Thanks everyone!

There's some great suggestions here!

Thank you.. I'll try some of those!

Wendii

My tips

* Do not watch TV in season either. Many people spend 2 hours per day watching TV, that is 12% of their waking hours. And: no, watching TV is not relaxing, scientific research has shown it is wearing you out.

* Play podcasts at 110-150% of their natural speed depending of the content. The higher speed saves you time and keeps your attention more closely focused.

* Put Getting Things Done at the top of your reading list, and work its ideas into your life. Make sure you never have to think about something for the second time.

* Read while on holidays (but you need your break!)

* Read at 150% of your comfortable speed. You will actually retain more of what you read because your brain will not wander.

Culling the backlog and curious about the 37 podcasts

I have to agree with richruh about not finishing a book just because you've started it. But I'd take it one step further. There's no need to leave a book on the backlog that I'm no longer interested in. Having a looming 88 books in the reading queue is pretty daunting. Culling from that list books that you've lost the passion or immediate interest to read also reduces some of the emotion weight of having such a large backlog.

I'm also curious about the 37 podcasts you are subscribed to. Would you mind listing them out here? I'm always on the prowl for new podcasts to evaluate - hah! right after I mentioned culling your backlog of books I'm looking to increase mine :)

Hi Dav

I undestand what you say about the backlog of books - but my mental list of books I want to read includes the whole of the British Library so 88 isn't so many! However, I do think that for others, if not for me, that a shorter list would be preferable. And, you're right, my interests change regularly so, my book choices do too.

As for podcasts, I literally periodically go into itunes and subscribe to every new careers and business cast in the interests of research. Gradually I whittle them back down to the ones I feel are really valuable to me, and then I start again! The 37 I have now are mostly a factor of doing just that about a month ago.

I hope that satisfies your curiousity :-)

Wendii