A detailed t
EDUCATION
The time management math that actually works: stop thinking 24, and start thinking 168
Thinking in terms of hours left in a day is depressing. Expand it to a week, and instantly your perspective changes.
Expert opinion by Jeff Haden
Feel like you don’t have time to do something you really want to do? Start a business? Take a class? Read? Exercise?
Fine. Let’s do a little math. There are 168 hours in a week. Say you work 40 hours a week. Actually, let’s say you work 50 hours a week. (Even though you may be at work for 50 hours, you aren’t working all 50, but that’s a subject for another post.)
And say you sleep eight hours a night. (Which you probably also don’t, which is another subject for another post.)
168 minus 50 minus 56 equals 62 hours. That’s what you have left, after work and sleep.
Now, say you commute an hour each way. (You probably don’t, and if you do, science says your relationship is bound to suffer.) Either way, let’s call it 10 hours. Now you’re down to 52 hours. Then throw in household chores, errands, family time... let’s give that four hours a day.
Now you’re down to 24 hours of “discretionary” time. Doesn’t seem like much.
But it’s actually a lot, especially after you claw back a few hours.
First, gain back time
Say you wish you had more time to read. Fine: listen to audiobooks during your commute. Sure, that means you have to be intentional about it. But if you turn an hour of your two-hour commute into reading time, that’s five hours a week, and for most people, that’s a lot. (If your commute is 30 minutes, and you “read” for 15, over the course of a week that’s still a nice chunk of time.)
Or say you want to walk more, since science says you should want to walk more. Have the occasional walking meeting. Steve Jobs swore by them. Or eat at your desk or workstation, and take a walk during your lunch break. (I ate my lunch while working in a factory, so don’t tell me it’s impossible. You just have to bring the right food.)
Or say you want to spend more time connecting with people you care about. My wife uses her car time to call family and friends.
One key to relatively effortless time management is double-dipping: pick an activity you have to perform, one that takes away from your discretionary time, and find a way to layer in something you want to do.
Keep in mind your “want to do” can be something silly. When I decided to listen to every Smashing Pumpkins album in order, I did in the car. At 20-plus hours, it took a couple of months, but that’s okay. Achieving my goofy little goal didn’t take time away from anything else.
The first step is to gain back a few hours by double-dipping.
Then...
Think in terms of weeks, not days
The reason we started with 168 hours instead of 24 hours is simple: having “only” two, or three, or even four “free” hours a day can feel depressing. (Most of us have more free hours than we think, but still: where time is concerned, what you have never feels like enough.)
Twenty-four hours sounds better. Once you claw back a few hours by double-dipping, 27 or 28 sounds even better.
Plus, you won’t do some of the things you wish you had time to do every day. If you want to exercise, three or four times a week is probably plenty. If you want to read more, two or three times a week may be sufficient. If you want to work on starting a business, four or five days a week may be perfect.
Framed that way, no one activity feels like it takes away too much of your discretionary time. Exercise for an hour three times a week, and you only reduce your 24 discretionary hours by three. Work on your business plan for an hour a day, five days a week, and that’s only five hours. Read for 30 minutes, three times a week, and you still have plenty of hours left.
Do a little mixing and matching. Work out certain days, and read the days you don’t work out. Work on your business plan certain days, and do a longer workout one of the days you don’t. Take a walk and listen to an audiobook.
Take a walk and talk through a business problem with someone whose advice you value. Use your car time to rehearse your investor pitch. (An event-planner friend asked me to fill in for a speaker on four hours’ notice, so I “wrote” and rehearsed my keynote on the three-hour drive to the venue.)
Then make your list
Write down the things you want to do, but don’t feel you have the time. Then write down how many hours a week you would like to spend doing those things.
Not how much time you think you have how much time you would like to have.
Say your list looks like this:
Start a side hustle: five hours
Exercise: three hours
Read: three hours
Hobbies: four hours
That’s 15 hours, which is less than the 24 you have available. Great.
Then again, life does happen. So first, find ways to double-dip so you don’t have to find hours to do those things. (Reading by listening to audiobooks is probably the easiest.)
Then embrace the fact you do have enough time to do at least some of the things you want to do; you just have to replace some of the things you default to doing. If you plop down in front of the TV and mindlessly choose something to watch, you aren’t “decompressing.” You’re wasting time you could spend doing something you actually enjoy. Or that makes you feel more satisfied and fulfilled. Or that gives your life greater meaning and purpose.
That’s the real key. Maximizing your discretionary hours isn’t about becoming incredibly efficient, or about rising and grinding, or about relentlessly making every single moment productive.
Maximizing your discretionary hours means having the time to do things you want to do.
Instead of feeling like you only get to do things you have to do.