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Precious Pockets of Time

July 31, 2001

"Obviously, everyone is allotted the same number of hours in a day.  Why is it that some people never find time to do what they intend to do, and others can always find time to get things done.

One of the great secrets of high achievers and anticrastinators is that they are mindful that every day is jam-packed with an incredible number of precious pockets of time, if you only learn to recognize and use them.  Here are four universal truths about pockets of time:

1. Free hours, afternoons, or entire days hardly ever come into our lives without a great deal of scheming and planning; even then, don't count on it.
2. No matter how important your project is or how much preplanning went into it, there will be interruptions.  Lots of them.  Count on it.
3. Complaining about interruptions and letting them stress you out won't help anything and won't make the interruptions go away.  Sometimes we can eliminate the source of our interruptions (take the phone off of the hook, do our work at the library, close the office door).  Sometimes we can't.
4. If interruptions continually cause you to start and stop your project, you may as well plan on working in starts and stops.

Even on your busiest days, you have a spare ten minutes here, twenty minutes there.  How much time could you put to good use if you worked on your lists or began ten minute projects while waiting for a meeting to begin or for a dental appointment, or while sitting in your car waiting for you child to come out of school?  You could:
* Plan
* Review your list
* Make a phone call
* Catch up on correspondence
* Outline a news release, report, letter or book
* Skim a magazine and decide whether it's work your time.

Right now - starting today - watch for a precious pocket of time and decide how you're going to use it.  A glance at your list can help you figure out what to do with this time.  Amazingly, the more you recognize and use these precious pockets of time, the more they seem to multiply (Emmett, 2000, pp.126-128)."

Reference:  Emmett, R. (2000).  The procrastinator's handbook: mastering the art of doing it now.  New York:  Walker and Company.

How do you utilize those precious pockets of time?

The Procrastinator's Handbook is available on loan from the Ohio State University Leadership Center.  A complete listing of all the Leadership Center's resources is available on our website http://leadershipcenter.osu.edu/

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Created: 2009-01-02, Updated: 2009-01-14