Time. It's your most valuable commodity. Are you spending it wisely?

Be ruthless with your time. It’s your most valuable commodity.

Life gets in the way. So what, you aren’t the only one facing this struggle. But how do we deal with it?

You continually hear from all the powers to be and the #lifegoals figures populating your screen that you should plan better, be more organised and structure your day to achieve every task, etc. etc. – and rightly so, structure your life to get the most out of it! We fully agree with anything that will positively influence your own personal outcomes.

But, we also understand that every so often someone will take your perfectly structured day and milk you of your valuable minutes. It might be your phone rings and that friend needs an hour of your time, you get stuck in a meeting, traffic shits all over you unexpectedly, but what do you do? You have to be a good friend and give them your time? You have to do those things for others right?

Let’s think about this. You can still be a good friend, and you can still achieve all those mandatory time consumers, but you have to determine how to do that in a way that will still allow you to master your own hourglass. How so? Prioritise your outcomes. Prioritise what actually works to benefit you, and help you to be the best version of yourself;

You cannot control the circumstances you have been dealt, but you must control the outcome.

If you need to take the call; take it, but be ruthless with the time you give it. If it is a continual negative impact of you, then wrap it up. If you have to stay back late at work, do it, but stop and plan exactly how to achieve the ‘why’ behind you staying back. You’re stuck in traffic? Put on a podcast and learn something. This is you controlling the outcome.

The more time we wish away on the task we see as a waste the more of our own life we wish away. After roughly nine years of my life spent on deployments or training exercises I had become the master this. I had become so good at wishing days away that I missed so much of the journey along the way. My lesson from this? What I want to impart on you in a few short, but valuable words are this:

You can earn more money, but you can’t earn more time.

Let’s now look at the how, this is not rocket science. You want to maximise your ability to control your outcome. Step 1; identify your outcomes. For me this means I have three whiteboards. One for the business, one for my own personal outcomes, and one for my daily non-negotiables. Don’t have the time or availability to use white boards? No worries I bet you have a smart phone. These transfer to a smart phone for the 8+ months a year I spend away. This is you recording your outcomes.

Each week, add in all the outcomes you need to achieve and when; gym, total Km’s to run, podcasts to listen to, family members to call, study to achieve, meal prep etc. – then make them happen. Determine your daily non-negotiable tasks. These are tasks you must complete before you allow yourself to binge Netflix or scroll the socials for hours.

Now for the most important parts: Tick these off. Don’t rub them out, tick them off as done. See your own progress and let it motivate you to get to the next task.

Secondly; maintain the structure. Continue this process every week. Streamline it where you need to but make the concept of mastering your own time, and controlling your own outcomes work for you.

You can’t necessarily control the hand you are dealt. But you can control how you shape it. Every single day you are given this opportunity, the opportunity to choose whether you will wish your one chance at life away, or whether you will make the most of every single minute you are given.

The choice is yours.