Time Management is Attention Management

Everybody obsesses over time management at some point in their journey. They think maybe if they create a complex calendar with times to do everything, magically they will be more productive. Wrong. You must understand, time management is attention management.

This makes this whole be productive and time management thing super easy to influence and control.

Time Management is Attention Management

For starters, time is an illusion. Seeking to control time is ineffective unless you’re the first human to create a time machine. If you live your life based on endless times to do things, you are stuck in an endless loop.

Example:

• Wake up at 7am.
• Coffee at 7:15am until 7:20am.
• Shower 7:22am to 7:28am.

Until you go through the Timer Method, you overanalyze everything. It is silly to want to live a rigid schedule as it won’t work on a long time frame. Life happens, and you’ll use this as a way to overthink your unproductiveness if you can’t follow the schedule exactly.

The only time I personally live a rigid schedule is when I’m in deep work mode, let’s say I’m writing a new book or launching a new course to my students. The other time is when I’ve got lots of meetings to go too. During those times I structure my day to maximize my time in between everything.

But my reasons are because I’ve got a team of people working with me, lots of moving parts, all while maintaining a personal life.

You don’t have a single excuse outside of you thinking living by a schedule will fix your productivity issue. This isn’t the root cause of you not living the life you want. The root cause is your attention management.

Attention Management

At the end of the day the root cause of time management is attention management. Once you begin giving your attention to positive actions, your life can’t help but become fantastic.

Your life is the sum total of your actions on a daily basis compounded over week and months. Meaning, if you don’t like your life you can either sit around being sad about it or you can make better decisions.

Instead of watching Netflix, mindlessly scrolling, or playing video games everyday as you do. Go take a walk, hit the gym, or create a business.

The main point is you start wherever you are right now.

Too many of you overestimate what you can do in 3-6 months time. While underestimating what you can do over a 12 month window. Understand, progress is slow in the beginning. You’re learning, testing new things, building your life, and don’t have the advantage of money or other people yet.

Everything You Do Must Have Purpose

Most of you do is mindless. Yes, you will defensively disagree with me at first. You think you’ve been in control the whole time. Yet when you begin to realize how much what you do is reactionary you’ll realize you, “oops created a undesirable life” with relative ease.

You wake up do almost the exact same thing everyday and have for years. So much so it’s become ingrained in your very fabric of reality. For most people, they live their entire human life without ever realizing this.

I invite you to now begin being conscious of what you’re doing. Start with the little things like how you grab a cup of water. Don’t just grab it without thinking, feel yourself grabbing it.

When you’re eating, don’t just demolish the food without a second thought. Enjoy the food and take slow bites.

Or when you find yourself with nothing to do, maybe you’re in an Uber or waiting in line. Don’t just pull your phone out and begin mindlessly scrolling on social media. Instead, take in the scenery around you, listen to a podcast, or develop a business idea you have into steps.

Your goal is to reach a point where everything you do has a purpose. So much so that you no longer give into distractions. I put together a video on how to overcome distractions below to further emphasize this point.

Your Life is a Reflection

At the end of the day as you now realize your life is simply a reflection of your decisions compounded over time. Until now you’ve lived your life in a way that made what you now live not what you want. That’s why you found this blog article and today is the day your new life begins.

Too many people essentially eat McDonalds every day, drink soda, and don’t workout for years. Then can’t figure out why 2 days into a diet and workout plan they don’t have a 6-pack. It takes time and effort to make those changes.

Let’s set the right expectations. Don’t think you can magically read an article and immediately your life changes in an instant. It will take days to weeks of you remembering what we’ve spoken about today to fully change your life.

I send out weekly (sometimes daily) emails to give you constant reminders and actions to take so you change your life faster. Join here and I will send you a free guide to turning your life around.

Always the best,

Dylan Madden