On Time
“It’s a real time saver.”
Did I miss out on membership into the all important National Bank of Time where I can put the minutes saved up by using my smartphone, my dishwasher, or my whatever people are buying now and then spend said time at a later date on something I think is valuable?
Time cannot be saved. Time is always spent. Always. The five minutes you save doing something right now… will be spent by the time this day is over. It’s not hanging around or carrying over like cell phone minutes.
How often do you consciously use that time you’re saving with the stuff you use to do things you really, really want to do?
Me? Not very often. I save a few minutes here and a few minutes there and then, at the end of the day, I scratch my head and say, Really, is the day already over?
No, you cannot save time, you can only redirect it. Am I, are you, are we redirecting it consciously?
And, then, there’s efficiency.
Let us be efficient.
At what? And why? And is being efficient always better? What, exactly, does efficiency mean?
People have begun to confuse efficiency with being an immutable “good” value when it’s really a description of how a task is performed. I will go further and assert that every task is not done best when it is done “efficiently.” I can’t imagine my kids, for example, growing up and saying with tender hearts, Ah, yes, my mother… she was an efficient woman.
For me, personally, that’s actually a little horrifying.
I just wonder about these things… about time and efficiency and how it relates to who we are becoming as a civilization, you know?
Have we begun to prize these things as actual values?
Is saving time and being efficient really a suitable goal in and of itself?
Do we even realize that we’ve started doing this? And all this time that we’re redirecting (not saving) what are we doing with it? Are we creating things? Becoming more human? Making this world better? Or, heck, are we even experiencing personal peace in those few minutes we’ve “saved”?
I just don’t know.
What do you think?
About saving time?
About being efficient?
About how weird I’m being right now?
29 Responses to On Time
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I’m not real good at saving time. However, I am AWESOME at wasting time.
See this comment right here as Exhibit #1.
Okay, so it’s a little weird. But I get it…sort of…
I relate it to “living” and the “business of living”. When I’m efficient at the “business of living”, I have more time for the actual “living” along with the ability to be completely present.
I don’t think my daughter will ever say that her mom was efficient, but I do think that she will remember that mom always had time to spend fully with her…
Thinking about it, I guess I don’t really channel those “saved” minutes into something productive or something I want to do.
That said, I’m all for saving time on things I don’t want to do. Cleaning, dishes, etc. While I may not be able to account for the time I saved by using the dishwasher, I certainly know I’m happier because I didn’t have to spend an extra 20 minutes washing the dishes.
As for efficiency, I tend to try for the most efficient route, except for dealings with friends or family. At work, I’m looking for the most efficient way to get customers through. The most efficient way to complete X task or Y task. I do this not to save time, per se, but because that’s what I’m being paid for.
In my personal life, I feel the same way. I would rather complete tasks efficiently, instead of wasting time doing something the hard way, or what have you. Doing things quickly lets you do more things. But, like you said, it’s not always beneficial, especially when you’re dealing with family or friends.
Those moments, you savor. No matter how long it takes.
Actually (you knew I’d have read about this, right?) the studies show that back BEFORE we had some “time-saving” devices, we weorked less hours, took more vacation, and had much fewer stress-related health conditions. So….
@Nanna,
I was thinking the very same thing while reading this blog. It seems to me that living more ‘mindfully’ eventually takes less time and leaves me more peaceful. Or sumpthin.
@Nanna, Yeah, people were much more relaxed, even ten years ago. Now our society is gogoGOdammitGO! It’s sad.
Why do you have to hate on efficiency, hm?
I never think about “saving time.” I just hate stop lights because they stop me from being where I’m going.
That’s a metaphor maybe.
It’s funny that with all the “time savers” we have at our disposal, we all seem more rushed and trying to figure out how to BE more efficient. Isn’t that what the internetz and laptops and iPhones and microwaves were supposed to be doing, all along?
Efficiency is great if you’re in surgery.
Life likes to throw us curve balls. I’m more about enjoying the time with my kid and family than worrying about being efficient. Dodging the curve balls is what makes life living.
But I do regularly say to myself, “Oh, I’m going upstairs, now, so I need to take those shoes and that purse and on my way through the kitchen I need to put this glass in the dishwasher”, etc – ALL THE TIME.
I use “saved” time to either spend more moments with my kids, or, if that isn’t possible, to spend more time relaxing and/or not being “on”.
I think there are lots of time savers out there. I think there are efficient ways to do many things these days. But my workload doesn’t seem less — seems like the more efficient we become, the more crap there is to do. But that’s not really my point. My point is that there are some people far too consumed with efficiency and time savers and all that jazz … so consumed that they don’t enjoy just doing nothing. Or doing something slowly. Life, cliche though it may be, is about the journey. I want to enjoy it and have as much fun as possible, not get through my life in an efficient, time-saving manner.
WIth my free time, i am extremely efficient. I milk every second of it and make the most of it.
With my Productivity time (like right now when i should be working), im a mess (like right now, blogging when i should be NOT blogging)
No… You’re right. You can’t “save” time. You can savor time — like family get-togethers, vacations, the last few days of what you know to be a loved one’s life — but you can’t save it. Yes, you can do some things faster, but you’re right; at the end of the day, the day is still done, and you say to yourself, “That’s it?!”
We make lists to “save” time, but making those lists takes time. They soothe me, yeah, but if I’d just dived in, would I have gotten it done faster? Or would I have forgotten something important? I’d rather take the time to make the list and soothe my frazzled mind than realize when the task is “done” that I forgot something important.
And you know, at the end of it all, time is short. Use it the way you want, not the way other people or big corporations want you to.
I think the key to being efficient, is to know when. For example, yesterday, my family put our Christmas Tree up. First we cleared the room of furniture, then we went shopping for the tree and brought it home. As my Pete and his father were putting it in the stand, I got the vacuum and plugged it in so we could suck up the needles that fell *before* they were tracked all over the house. Then when the tree was lit and decorated, we brought the furniture back in, and done. Efficiency = good.
When my 3 year old son wants to “help” me fold laundry, I have him pull socks and underwear out of each basket and throw them in an empty basket. Then he goes about re-separating them into baskets for him, his brother, and mommy and daddy. Then he turns all the socks right side out. Then all the underwear. Then he does his best to fold the socks. All of this is terribly inefficient, but it takes him long enough that when he’s done, I’m done, too. He feels like he helped, we spent time together, I didn’t lose my cool, nor did I lose track of him, and find him later in a bathtub. With his clothes on. Covered in Bubble Bath. With no water. Here, Efficiency = Bad.
See? And as for saved time, I think it *is* saved even if the time just gets spent doing something I want to do, like breathing ten times without being asked for something.
@Allyson,
You are brilliant..and a GOOD mom!
Firstly, I am tripped out that the blogisphere is commenting on recent events in my life, unknowingly of course.
I recently attended a course all about time management. One of the prime messages I heard was utilizing the time we have more effectively, rather than efficiently. We were encouraged to think in both professional and personal terms, but as this was on the company dime, the implied result was more time to do more work. There was koolaid.
Firstly, I am tripped out that the blogisphere is commenting on recent events in my life, unknowingly of course.
I recently attended a course all about time management. One of the prime messages I heard was utilizing the time we have more effectively, rather than efficiently. We were encouraged to think in both professional and personal terms, but as this was on the company dime, the implied result was more time to do more work. There was koolaid.
I feel about time the way I feel about money.
It’s not about trying to accumulate a pile of it, but about spending it consciously in the ways that are important to me whenever possible.
It reminds of checking out at the grocery and having the cashier (and/or the receipt) say, “You saved $13.49 today!”. No, I didn’t. Well, perhaps I did, but it very little to do with what I did or didn’t spend in this particular transaction.
On the other hand, “save” doesn’t really have to mean for a later time. Instead, it can be for a different purpose. So the repurposing or redirecting that you describe is simply another form of saving. And now I feel pedantic since that misses your point entirely.
Perhaps the real irony of this issue for me is the amount of time I spend saving pennies on minor purchases and the correspondingly ease with which I will spend larger amounts of money. Elaborating on my priorities of travel, entertainment and gifts would help to explain some of it, until someone tries to understand why I don’t have cable television despite watching many hours of television per week. Time wasted saving pennies on peanut butter. Time wasted watching copious amounts of television. No wonder I have no time for blogging!
I’m quite happy with how I spend my time. Like reading this post. Really, I feel it was a good decision.
i’m just trying to get through my wednesday and you want me to think about heavy stuff like this? pffffffffffffft!
What Britt said. (See how much time I saved there?)
I saved 14 minutes by making my egg roll in the microwave instead of the oven and let me just say that the time saved didn’t make it a better egg roll, in fact can I have a do over?
This post reminds me of my brother. When he feels he is being his most efficient, he has his day planned down to the minute. Just a few weeks ago I looked at his to-do list and saw a notation that read, “SS&S”. When I asked, he proudly announced that it means, ‘shit, shower & shave’, and that it takes 22 minutes. *sigh*
But I’m getting off topic… I find that when he is at his ‘most efficient’, he is also constantly stressed about being ‘late’. Life, family, love, spontaneity, and serendipity are all put aside in the name of productivity. Even when he does stop to smell the roses, he’s only half there. The other half of him is worried about getting behind, about not doing enough, or busy texting. I certainly don’t get as much done in a day as he does, I wish! Lol. But I do find oodles of joy in those moments that are impossible to plan. Laughs and deep conversations with loved ones, naps with my two cats, reading a blog that makes me think, enjoying the sights and sounds of life… And as an added bonus, I dont have high blood pressure like he does either!
This post reminds me of my brother. When he feels he is being his most efficient, he has his day planned down to the minute. Just a few weeks ago I looked at his to-do list and saw a notation that read, “SS&S”. When I asked, he proudly announced that it means, ‘shit, shower & shave’, and that it takes 22 minutes. *sigh*
But I’m getting off topic… I find that when he is at his ‘most efficient’, he is also constantly stressed about being ‘late’. Life, family, love, spontaneity, and serendipity are all put aside in the name of productivity. Even when he does stop to smell the roses, he’s only half there. The other half of him is worried about getting behind, about not doing enough, or busy texting. I certainly don’t get as much done in a day as he does, I wish! Lol. But I do find oodles of joy in those moments that are impossible to plan. Laughs and deep conversations with loved ones, naps with my two cats, reading a blog that makes me think, enjoying the sights and sounds of life… And as an added bonus, I dont have high blood pressure like he does either!
What Britt said. (See how much time I saved there?)
I saved 14 minutes by making my egg roll in the microwave instead of the oven and let me just say that the time saved didn’t make it a better egg roll, in fact can I have a do over?
[...] resources we have at our disposal, time is the most finite. We can’t make or buy more and we can’t save it. We all get the exact same amount every single [...]
“Unchecked Hegemony of Patriarchal Elites”? Oh you mean Rahm Emmanual, the Felon Rob Blagojevich, Harry Reid, Bill, the womanizer Clinton, Al “off-his-meds-again” Gore, Barack Obama, Spooky Dude George Soros, the entire Lame-Stream media including ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, More BS, etc. etc. Yeah, I get it now. ohhhh THAT hegemony! oh yeah, I see what you mean, Faiqa. I think. Oh, I left out the lesbian on MSNBC. How could I be so patriarchal and sexist? She’s a man too.