There are days when it seems like there weren’t 24 hours in the day. It’s like the hours are disappearing or the clocks are running faster. Sorry to break it to you, but none of this is happening. The lack of time that you’re experiencing is just an illusion. Your concern about not having enough time in the 24 hours in a day is not invalid. You’re not alone. However, the responsibility for fixing this issue is on your shoulders. What you need to do is learn to manage what you’ve been given. Of course, no one can add an extra hour to the day. But what you can do is use every minute to your benefit. If you struggle in dealing with a lack of time, you’ve come to the right place!
Why Do You Feel Like Having a Lack of Time?
Lack of time is experienced when certain bad habits take over your routine. These habits are unintentional, and you may not even realize that they are connected to your lack of productivity. Here’s a quick rundown of some of these habits that are the most common among people who tend to complain of a lack of time. Once you’re aware of these causes, you can work to eliminate the problem from its roots.
1. Lack of Sleep or Oversleeping
You know how when your smart devices aren’t working, so you restart them and they start to work fine? Well, the human equivalent of that is sleeping. Sleeping allows your body and mind to refresh. It gives you back all the drained energy and provides a fresh start for the new day. However, it needs to be done right. What this means is that you should sleep just the right amount. Six to eight hours of sleep is the ideal range for adults. Lack of sleep leads to a lack of productivity. Similarly, oversleeping will keep you lazy throughout the day. Adopt
healthy sleeping habits. More importantly, you should sleep comfortably. Have a nice, relaxing bed where you can sleep in a comfortable posture. Try to keep the temperature of the room optimal so that you’re not disturbed through the night. If you find sunlight disturbing, use an eye mask while sleeping. If you have noisy neighbors, use earplugs. Do all that you can to give yourself the best night’s sleep every night.
2. Multitasking
This might be a surprise for a lot of you. Multitasking is not a way to be efficient or productive. In fact, it is
the polar opposite. Your brain can focus on only one thing at a time.((Forbes:
Multitasking Damages Your Brain And Career, New Studies Suggests)) If you force it to focus on more, it fails to perform well in either task. It is proven that multitasking slows down your brain performance. Your brain is unable to focus on either of the tasks that you’re multitasking. So, you end up spending more time completing them, and the results aren’t your best performance either. Tackling two different tasks, even if they’re closely related, messes up with your mind. The ideas and requirements for both the tasks get mixed up. You risk your performance, quality of work, and end up wasting your precious time too. All in all, multitasking is not worth the risk at all.
3. Working Non-Stop
What’s the best way to do more in less time? Most would say working non-stop in one go shall do the trick. Well, the truth is, if you go on and work continuously, you’re only wasting your time. Your productivity and motivation are affected due to the constant strain on your mind. This way, you’re not utilizing time to its maximum because your brain slows down and you need more time to finish tasks that would otherwise require lesser time. A better approach is to work with breaks. You shouldn’t feel guilty about these breaks in your workday. Instead, look at these time slots as a source of refreshing your brain. A 5-minute break every couple of hours is just enough to recharge your energy levels and bring that the motivation you need to quickly finish off your work.
4. Distractions
Working in an environment full of distractions is one of the biggest reasons that gives you a sense of a lack of time. You end up staring out your window, looking for your favorite pen, or doing something completely pointless instead of spending time finishing what you’re supposed to. The best way to minimize your lack of time is to set up a productive workspace. If you’re working from home, designate a specific space for your work where you don’t sleep or relax. This space should only be for work. If you’re in an office, have all your essentials within reach. A water bottle, a snack, stationery, notes, chargers, devices that you need, and everything else that you could possibly need during work should be near your workspace. This will keep you from wasting time or breaking your workflow.
How to Get the Most Out of Your Day
On top of getting rid of the aforementioned causes, you can also add some more healthy practices to your routine to get the most out of the day. These tips will eradicate the lack of time that you’re facing otherwise.
1. Have an Organized Plan
Starting the day with a plan is one great tip to avoid a lack of time. A well-planned to-do list is one of the secrets of the most successful people in the world. If you can put all your tasks of the day and week in a calculated plan, you will end up utilizing your time way more effectively. You can use some very simple yet
fool-proof strategies to devise a to-do list that will work wonders for you. A plan or to-do list works like your assistant. It reminds you exactly what needs to be done, when your work is due, how long each task should take, and where you can adjust urgent or unexpected work.
2. Prioritize
Prioritization is something you should adopt even if you don’t experience the illusion of a lack of time. If you do have a lack of time, you shouldn’t skip it at all! This is the simple technique of what’s most important on top. For example, start your day with the task that you know needs to be to be finished by the end of the day. The ones that will either take less time or aren’t due right away can be pushed to later days. Prioritizing also needs to be included in other parts of your life. So, prioritize your work and personal life to maintain a balance. This makes your overall life convenient and easier to manage. Learn more about prioritization:
How to Prioritize Right in 10 Minutes and Work 10X Faster
3. Avoid Procrastination
You may think you’re not a procrastinator. But if you think there’s a lack of time, then procrastination is a contributing habit. Maybe not consciously, but you push your tasks to the last minute. You fail to stay attentive, which is why you have to spend more time on minor jobs too. Focus is hard to gain but easy to lose. All these are
signs of procrastination. If you want to eradicate the lack of time from your life, you have to get rid of procrastination as well. Luckily, you can find a lot of easy tips and strategies online to do so.
4. Improve Time Management
It all comes down to
time management. This skill is the magic wand that helps you use every hour of the day. It may sound pretty simple. You do use all the hours in the day already. However, if you sit down and calculate how much time you’ve actually used in the day, you’ll realize that you waste more than half of your time. Time-management is what keeps you from wasting this uncalculated time. It is the skill that gives you the power to be productive through every minute. Moreover, if you can learn to manage your time, you’ll automatically avoid procrastination, too.((Ferris State University:
Procrastination and Time Management)) With this skill alone, you’ll notice a huge difference in terms of the lack of time that you were experiencing beforehand.
Bottom Line
In the end, one thing is for sure: there is no such thing as a lack of time. You’re the one who either puts the time to use or lets it go to waste. If you can keep yourself from wasting the defined hours of the day in the wrong areas and utilize them efficiently, you’ll have plenty of time to manage all that you need to. The tips that you’ve learned today are priceless. In a world like this, time is money. With the knowledge that you’ve gained, you’re on your way to endless wealth and productivity! So, start using these tips to improve your life by utilizing every second of the day. Get on with this new lifestyle to conquer anything and everything in this world!
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