So often we have heard ourselves say that we don’t have time. If we reflect on that statement, we will realise it is paradoxical. The only real thing that each living person does have in equal measure is time. So when we do say that we don’t have time, effectively we are expressing our frustration at our inability to do as much as we want in the finite time of 1440 minutes each of us gets every day.

It would serve us well to reflect on why we live with the feeling of being strapped for time, and yet admire others for much they achieve.

We feel short of time when we prioritise incorrectly. We need to recognise the important things in our life and ensure they get adequate time. This often means developing the ability to say no to something that is tempting to do but lower in our priority.

A bucket that leaks will always find itself empty. If we are not aware of the precious minutes we waste without even realising it, we will always feel we don’t have enough time. We just need to be constantly aware of how we have spent the last few minutes that will never come back.

If we get too caught up in being perfectionists and micromanage everything all the time, we will, of course keep ourselves meaningfully occupied, but at the cost of being unable to give time where needed. But if we trust people around us, we learn to share our responsibilities with them, and they share their time with us, giving us the ability to do more.

Any system out of balance is not sustainable. Managing time and maintaining balance in life go hand in hand. Not only does a consciously balanced life give us the freedom to devote ourselves more in an area when needed, but it also takes away from spending precious time mending our relationships and health because we allowed the imbalances to creep in.

And most importantly, time is as much a function of our state of mind as it is the physical units available every day. An agitated mind feels pressured, lacks clarity, compromises its potential, and therefore is able to achieve much less. Living with calm awareness sharpens our ability to do much more in the same time frame.

We have the time. The question we need to ask ourselves is whether it is being filled up with what we should be doing, or by what people expect us to do. Of course, we must fulfill our duties and responsibilities, and be there for others, but we need to be careful that our time doesn’t get scripted by others around us.

At the end of the day when we review what we did, compared to what we should have done, we will gradually learn a lot about ourselves. But it is only when we make time to be honest with ourselves, will we honestly overcome the problem of living with the feeling that we don’t have time.

(Picture-On the seafront at Yaletown,Vancouver)