Changing Your Friendship Status with Time

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Welcome, welcome.

Welcome to this episode of Teachers in Business. Happy New Year, everyone, welcome to 2022. Hopefully yours is off to a slightly less rocky start than mine is. It's a little crazy here with all the COVID and all the rest. But we shall see this week, really this month, what I want to talk about on the podcast is time. If you are a teacher, if you are a parent, if you are a business owner, if you are thinking about being one of those things that you're not quite yet, one of the biggest struggles of work, and life and family and everything else is time. One of the things that I hear from clients, from friends, from colleagues, from family members from everyone is all of the thoughts they have about time, we constantly talk about time. And you know, what I've noticed in the last, you know, this is something I personally have been working on for a long time, my relationship with time. And so I really hear it when people talk about it. In for the most part, we talk about time, like collectively as a society, but particularly as women, as people who are in helping fields as people who are trying to build something of our own with a you know, with only so many hours in a day, we talk about time as the enemy, right? We are, it sounds like I don't have enough time. I'm running out of time. Time isn't on my side, I'm working against the clock, I just don't know where all my time goes, I never have enough of it. It's like this constant battle. And, you know, possibly some of these sound familiar, right? Like you thought these things I think we all have at some point. It's like you're in this constant war with time, right? It's you're warming it, you're battling it, you're like duking it out, you are also chasing it around, like you would a wild hodler. Like when you're like, right, but I just can't get it to do what I want it to do. Like it's always doing whatever the hell it wants. And also you're like forever looking under the couch cushions and under rocks everywhere else to find more of it. It's like this frantic battle to like, catch it, control it and make it do Your will. And, you know, if you've ever had a toddler, or students in a classroom, or a family or a dog or anything else, the more you know, just as well as I do that the more frantically you battle, the more battles back, right, like if you go, you know, I can remember when I was a middle school teacher, when I went to like, unconsciously like battle, and I would bring battle to a 13 year old they repel right back, it was one of those like, Oh, God, that was me. And so what I'd like to help people with this month as the year starts, in what I'm focusing on in my Facebook group, if you're not in there, it's also called teachers in business, please come join us is, is changing sort of the friendship status as it were, with time. Right now it's your enemy. And it's this constant battle, it's this push pull, it's this panic, it's this frantic thing. And what I'd like is to help you change the status of your relationship to time so that it's not the enemy anymore, so that you guys are like, tight, like, besties like you talk on the regular. You you get along super well, you collaborate. And like, even if you don't get all the way to besties maybe we're frenemies, right, where like you're on really good terms part of the time and part of the time you're not but at least it's more often than when you were enemies. So with that in mind, what I want to talk about today is three thoughts about time that I hear constantly from people I've already sort of listed them out, and like ways to look at time and then offer you some ideas, some alternates that you might think about. Okay, so here we go. The first one is this thought of, I don't have enough time, and basically all the variations, so I'm running out of time. I can't find enough time in the day. Anything that's like time, so like the stars I have in my notes here is that it's any sort of thing that comes out of your mouth or out of your bank brain, we're looking at time as a limited resource and quantity. As like, as I can't think of the word right now Where'd my brain go? It's on vacation stuff as the opposite of abundant as scarce, there it is. So if you're thinking of time as this, like scarce resource that you have to like, like hoard, you know that, like I have a dear friend, her husband, like hoards days off, but then doesn't want to use them. And so it's like, well, but why have them if you're not going to use them, right? It's like you, if you could pocket time, and hold it in your pocket, your pockets would be full, you'd be like a, like a squirrel holding all the nuts or a chipmunk. So this is one thing that you, you know, might recognize in yourself. If you're not sure if this is you spend the next couple of days, you know, hearing yourself and just noticing you know, how you think about time. And if you hear any of this, like limited resource stuff. 

First, here are the two things to do first, ask yourself if that's actually true. Like, yes, it is actually true that time is a limited resource. But it is, is it as limited as you think it is. Is it as scarce as you think it is? Do you? Is it really running out? Or is it a matter of choices? Right? You know, for me, the most helpful thought alternative here has in this is something I've told you I've ever done for years. You know, it's okay. Is it really true that I don't have enough time? I always stop and go like, okay, is that really true? Well, probably not. And then the alternate thought that I come up with all the time that has helped me time and time again, is there's always enough time to do what matters. It's this idea that I have a sufficient amount of time to do the things that matter most. Like, here, you know, this is my day to day life right now, here in southeastern Pennsylvania, it looks like school is going to be closed all week because of staffing shortages from COVID. We don't know yet for sure. But like it's throwing my brain into like, oh my god, what am I going to do? What if my kids are home for two weeks or three weeks or like holy crap. And so it is shortening the amount of time I have in my day, obviously. And it's turned my brain last night into like, Oh, my God, we're gonna do I don't have enough time. I don't have that. I don't have enough time. But actually, it's like, okay, wait, is that true? And then what actually matters. So today, for me, what matters was posting the chart that I made yesterday, recording this podcast, I have to change a dentist appointment, I have to call a doctor's office, I have to check in with a couple of clients, because I'm gonna be out of the office tomorrow. And then you know, what gets done from there gets done from there, I do need to spend a little time on the course I'm building for my my college kids, because they start in less than three weeks, and I have not done. So for me, it's like, okay, wait, do all the things that are on my list for today actually need to get done right now? And if they don't, what happens? You know, which things really matter? And which things don't? Then I can choose? And it's like, oh, it takes the like, wind out of the I don't have enough, I don't have enough sales, right? That's scarcity. The second bucket of time thoughts, at least for me is this whole, like, I'm working against the clock, like Time isn't on my side. It's this. The way I wrote it down in my note as time as your adversary, as somebody, you're like, literally battling all the time where you're like, head to head and fighting for this resource duking it out. And this is, you know, for me, when I'm in this, it's like, it's a race and you're losing, right? It's a little bit competitive. It's a little bit Hunger Games, and some ways in it's like pitting you against yourself, right? It's pitting your priorities against each other. It's pitting what you want to get done versus what you need to get done versus your family versus your self care versus, you know, time and space to think, oh my gosh, it's like this whole, everything is pushing and pulling against each other and there's no winning, right? So for me the question I asked myself in this situation is, is there a battle? And what does an easy win look like? So you know, when it's this like adversarial thing. It's like, Wait, oh, wait, is there actually a battle going on here? Or am I like manufacturing this like race against time, because that's what society tells me everything has to be like, usually that's, that's manufacturing. The second thing though, is like, what's the easy winner? Well, the easy win is for me to choose. So the thought for me underneath here is I choose how to spend my time. It's changing from battle to collaboration. It's this like I am in partnership with time, we decide what we're doing. And sometimes it's, you know, getting lots of little things done. Sometimes it's getting one thing done, sometimes it's not getting anything's done. It depends on the day. But it's like, okay, how do I take this from battle mode to collaboration mode, right? In my kids, my daughter plays a lot of Minecraft. It's like, like survival mode versus creative mode, right? How do you take your brain out of survival mode in this battle with time and into collaboration. And for me, like sitting down in, I choose how to spend my time shifts me almost immediately. Now it took me a long time to get there. And this is stuff that comes with practice. And I know it's possible, you're sitting out there thinking now like, Okay, this sounds great. But like, it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's just like, you don't just get to change that. But actually, you do. Like I am the poster child for I used to have 96 jobs and a million things going on and a constant panic attack in the background. Like I get it, like, believe me. And I have friends now. You know, three or so years into me really working on this that say to me, like, it's so different. You're so different in that way, you're so much more settled, everything is calm, you don't get nearly as flustered. I hear this from people who I've known a long time, who know me well. And it's like, oh, okay, yeah, this has made a huge difference. And really all it is, is noticing, and then practicing. It's like noticing when I'm in a battle a time when I'm like having this art, like arbitrary battle that doesn't matter. And then deciding to think differently. It's really all it is. The third bucket is all of the thoughts that are like well, that I don't know where my time goes like Time flies by I don't know where it is. It's the like, any of the thoughts that like time is outside of your control. Like it's just something that happens to you. It's something that passes by, it's something you can't get a hold of, it's something you can't control. It's something that like it just like it just slips through your fingers, like, oh my god, what am I gonna do? It's like trying to hold 1000 grains of sand and they just like through the hourglass, and oh my god, what are we gonna do? When I am in the like, Oh, my God, time is flying by Holy crap. It's just running out and it's running short. It's out of my control. I can't decide what it does. When I'm in that bucket where time feels really out of my control. The question I asked myself is, what, what is my role in time? I know that sounds odd. But here's why I think about it that way. Like, I know that my role in relationship to time is to choose how to spend it. Right. I make choices all day long. Sometimes it's Netflix, too. Sometimes it's reading my book on the couch, sometimes it's working. Sometimes it's sleeping, I choose, those are all choices, and I'm good with all the choices I make, like I don't beat myself up over them. So if time is feeling out of control, it's like okay, wait, what? What's my role here? Like, oh, maybe it's just remembering that it's not actually out of my control. It's feeling like it. And that's okay. But I can you know, it's like I hopped out of the driver's seat for a second. And the bus was still going and it was like, Oh, wait, wait. I'm supposed to be driving here. Hold on. Let me sit back down. Let me get back control of us. And let me settle. The thought that I use constantly. Is is really a hard one to grab. So there's like this intermediate one I'd like to propose. I'd like to propose just simply the thought of I control my time. My time is within my control. The thought that I think all the time that I think is super powerful is I create time. I create time because in the way I think about this is like I literally create time, I create time to do the things that need to get done by my choices. My choices create time. So I create time. Like it's a logical mathematical problem that I can logic my way to being a creator of time. And maybe you can, maybe you can't.

But with practice, it comes. So if you're feeling frantic, if you're feeling scattered, if you're feeling scarce, if you're feeling like you're in a constant war with time, step one is to notice it. Step two is to really hear which bucket of thoughts are overriding? Like, is it the time is limited resource? Is it the time is your adversary in? Or is it the time is out of your control that like you don't get to drive. And then to notice, when those thoughts come up, and practice something different, like this is work that as a business coach, I do with clients all the time, because it really matters for the amount we accomplish, the way we accomplish it, how our businesses run, how our classrooms run, and how our lives run, for us to move from enemy with time to do bestie. Like everything gets easier when you're not in a constant war. So if you have questions about this, coming to my Facebook group or send me a message, come hang out with us. We're going to talk more about time this month about making time a friend versus an enemy. If you really want to work on this. If you are building a business, and you constantly feel like you're out of time, if you're fighting time so hard, and you cannot get it to do what you want. Because it's like an angry toddler. Let's come talk about it. This is one of my strongest suits, I helped my clients change this relationship. It doesn't take very long. And it really makes a world of difference. You could six months from now. Just know that time is within your control. Know that you create the time and know that you spend your time as exactly as you want all the time and not have this constant time panic anymore. It could be gone. Like literally gone. Can you imagine your life without all this panic would be so nice. So if that's something you are interested in, please just send me a message. Let's talk about it. And we'll talk about weather how I can help you do that and you can become a client. So happy 2020 Welcome to a new year. Welcome to a new version relating to time, and I'll see you next week.