Remain aware of the value of time; do those things that matter now; and establish the momentum of effective energy that is the precursor for opening the doors of opportunity that generate consistent results! Choose a place to expend that ephemeral gift of time where you can maximize your earning potential and have fun in the process. “We all only have 24 hours in a day, what we choose to do with this allocation of time will impact our success and influence our destiny.”
“Hours are like diamonds, don’t let them waste, time waits for no one and it won’t wait for me” — Rolling Stones, ” Time Waits for No One”
We can become devoted to an endless series of tasks which lack a connection to our purpose, a compass for our direction, or a worthy end that offers reward through meaning. We create tasks to fill the void of time. We give our ownership of our most precious commodity, time, to others on whim or thoughtful decision. When we decide to give time to another we must do so with an understanding that we will never get the minutes, hours or possibly days or years back. We must be able to play it forward while receiving a value equal to that which we give through the extension of our time. Time will go by without purpose, direction or end if we lack an anchor to our principles, a firmness of our resolve while continuing to exist without the pulse of our passion.
Think about this; it’s not the years in our life, it’s the life in our years! The life we actually live as opposed to the existence that is measured by chronology, is relatively short. We seek the rote, the safe, the pleasures that distract but we rarely take time to truly live, engaged in the knowledge of self and the enjoyment from the company of others who are worthy of our time.
We set ourselves up to fail by abusing time in the following way:
- We perform activity just for the sake of activity
- We perform secondary activities and ignore our primary responsibilities
- We choose the comfort of rote activity over those which require competence, diligence and more effort
- We choose not to risk
- We delay that “first step” (How many times have you seen people defer or push things off until tomorrow? I once read a sign in a bar that read “free beer tomorrow.” There was never free beer.)
- Each of us are allotted the same amount of hours in a day, 24. How we use the minutes and hours that comprise a day will largely determine our happiness.
Be aware of those passing moments and minutes that you will never recoup. If awareness carries that obligation to act, then use your time in the following way:
- Play it forward. Know with clarity, your purpose and your ultimate goal. Start now by taking steps from thought to decisive action. Make your purpose come alive as you incrementally achieve that which ultimately realizes your goal.
- Live congruent with your why, your purpose. Your purpose has nothing to do with idle chatter and your involvement in anything or anyone that distracts or detracts you from pursuing that which is delineated by your purpose. Your ultimate responsibility is not taking care of a customer or following the unsolicited advice of others; your ultimate responsibility is to yourself!
- Every day learn something new. Apply this to your arsenal of competency. Use this skill in your daily interaction with co-workers, customers, and family members. Absorb and apply. Starve for knowledge, thirst for learning.
- Nothing happens without risk. Nothing happens without that first step which is always a risk. See your opportunity and seize it by taking that first bold step. It can make a world of difference. Remember the words of Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon; “This is a small step for man, a giant leap for mankind.”
- The Think and Do Effect. The distance between deliberate thought and audacious action is the compelling difference in most activity. The shorter the distance between thought and action, the greater the likelihood of success in the endeavor and the inverse is also true. The longer we delay, the longer we wait, the more we waste time; someone somewhere is creating an opportunity from the void that was once our chance to seize it.
- Activity Rules Success. Many opportunities in life are realized by people who just show up. Glaringly absent from this statement, but directly inferred is that many people do not show up. Showing up is not just the physical manifestation of a body; it is the actual follow-through from commitment to result and obligation to origination and successful completion of task. Those who show up with purposeful activity, resolve of purpose, and clarity of message have a chance to make things happen.
- Rule your success through those activities which engage people from the emotional, physical, spiritual and intellectual domains. Focus your actions on those things which make a difference in your future. Generate ideas from people with their sleeves rolled up, doing the heavy lifting in the company. Solicit ideas from those who are in closest proximity to the client.
- Where beneficial, design and deliver those ideas from the confines of your conference room to those areas that include the people, product and profit of a client. Take the ideas from your workstations and conference room, and transition them from a client’s hope or wish to a valuable commodity or experience.
In life;
- it is always “five minutes to midnight”. Think on this. Life is short regardless of span in terms of years and it is subject to the laws of nature in its most tenuous state; living life is a risk, there is no such thing as an existence that is hermetically sealed from the sands of time or the ravages of fate.
The circle of life is always running from five minutes to midnight.
Use your time wisely; choose life over existence!
