“Our days and our lives are pathetically shortened by miscellaneous abuses and confusions of time. We are novices at the art of making plans and have trouble remembering the plans we have made. We ignore the time that is open to us. We diminish ourselves by wishing time to pass. We are, for the most part, incapable of real concentration. Our days are broken by distraction, scrambled up into muddles of chores, errands, impulses, evasions, interruptions and delays, besotted with routine. We characteristically fail to see the ways in which a given period can be expanded, deepened and slowed by the exercise of will and awareness. Deprived of this power and isolated from continuity, we often feel small, momentary, almost transparent, like paper-thin façades of being.”
Robert Grudin, Time And The Art Of Living (Page 20)
“In planning ahead we should remember that usable time is at best 80 to 85 percent of total time. Long unbroken periods contain more usable time than do short periods totaling the same length.”
Robert Grudin, Time And The Art Of Living (Page 3)
Time And The Art Of Living [Book]
Book Overview: This is a book about time–about one’s own journey through it and, more important, about enlarging the pleasure one takes in that journey. It’s about memory of the past, hope and fear for the future, and how they color, for better and for worse, one’s experience of the present. Ultimately, it’s a book about freedom–freedom from despair of the clock, of the aging body, of the seeming waste of one’s daily routine, the freedom that comes with acceptance and appreciation of the human dimensions of time and of the place of each passing moment on life’s bounteous continuum. For Robert Grudin, living is an art, and cultivating a creative partnership with time is one of the keys to mastering it. In a series of wise, witty, and playful meditations, he suggests that happiness lies not in the effort to conquer time but rather in learning “to bend to its curve,” in hearing its music and learning to dance to it. Grudin offers practical advice and mental exercises designed to help the reader use time more effectively, but this is no ordinary self-help book. It is instead a kind of wisdom literature, a guide to life, a feast for the mind and for the spirit.
“When you start protecting your time, something interesting happens. People who depend on you learn to plan better themselves. They start respecting your boundaries. And the stuff that’s truly urgent becomes clear. Will some people be disappointed? Definitely. And that’s okay. Because building a meaningful life sometimes means disappointing others to avoid constantly disappointing yourself. How you spend your time is a reflection of your priorities. And you don’t need to apologize for prioritizing what matters to you.”
Justin Welsh
“It takes discipline not to insist on doing everything yourself. Especially when you know how to do many of those things well. Especially when you have high standards about how they should be done. Even if you enjoy doing them—whether that’s mowing your own lawn, writing your speeches, making your own schedule, or answering your own phone. Often, the best way to manage the load is to share the load. Woe is the person who wears themselves out on trivial matters and then, when the big moments come, is out of energy. Woe is the person (and the people around them) who is so mentally exhausted and strung out because they’ve taken everything upon themselves that now, when things go wrong, there’s no slack or cushion to absorb the additional stress.”
Ryan Holiday, Discipline Is Destiny (Page 193)
“These days, I try to treat my attention like the precious resource that it is. I keep my phone on Do Not Disturb, 24/7/365. Only my wife and mother can get through. And everything else can wait. I schedule one hour of ‘thinking time’ every week. Just me, a pencil, and a notebook. No devices. I use an auto-responder on most social channels. This helps set clear expectations, and I’ve found people usually respect boundaries when you lay them out. I say no to 100% of ‘brain-pick’ requests. My mental space is non-negotiable. I’ve shared almost everything I know through social media, podcast interviews, and my digital products. My auto-responders redirect people to my content when they want advice. I protect my sleep religiously. I’m in bed by 9:30 pm most nights. And I’ve started leaving my phone in the kitchen. One of the surprising parts about all this is that my business hasn’t suffered. Because clear thinking leads to better decisions, and better decisions lead to better outcomes.”
Justin Welsh
“The number of people who stand ready to consume one’s time to no purpose is almost countless.”
Booker T. Washington, via Discipline Is Destiny (Page 116)
“Two simple rules: (1) You get better at what you practice. (2) Everything is practice. Look around and you may be surprised by what people are “practicing” each day. If you consider each moment a repetition, what are most people training for all day long? Many people are practicing getting mad on social media. Others are practicing the fine art of noticing how they have been wronged. Still more have mastered the craft of making plans (but never following through). But, of course, it doesn’t have to be that way. What are you practicing?”
James Clear
“Setting priorities requires setting posteriorities as well. A priority is something that you do more of and sooner, whereas a posteriority is something you do less of or later. You are probably already overwhelmed with too much to do and too little time. Because of this, for you to embark on a new task, you must discontinue an old task. Getting into something new requires getting out of another activity. Before you commit to a new undertaking, ask yourself, ‘What am I going to stop doing so that I have enough time to work on this new task?'”
Brian Tracy, via No Excuses! (Page 193)
“Productivity is most important for things you don’t want to be doing. Most people want to increase productivity so they can spend less time on the task. But before you worry about being more productive, think about being more selective. Rather than focusing on increasing productivity, it may be worth asking, ‘What would I be delighted to spend time on, even if it went slowly?’ Direct your energy toward figuring out how to start what you want to do rather than thinking about how to shorten what you don’t want to do.”
James Clear
“How can I overlap the things I enjoy? For example, maybe you want to exercise and spend time with your spouse. What type of exercise sounds fun to do with your spouse? Or perhaps you’d like to hang out with friends and build your career. How can you find ways to work with people you like being around? It doesn’t always work, but there are usually a few areas of life you can overlap in an enjoyable way. Look for the overlap.”
James Clear
“Try to imagine a life without timekeeping. You probably can’t. You know the month, the year, the day of the week. There is a clock on your wall or the dashboard of your car. You have a schedule, a calendar, a time for dinner or a movie. Yet all around you, timekeeping is ignored. Birds are not late. A dog does not check its watch. Deer do not fret over passing birthdays. Man alone measures time. Man alone chimes the hour. And, because of this, man alone suffers a paralyzing fear that no other creature endures. A fear of time running out.”
Mitch Albom
23 Greg McKeown Quotes from Essentialism and How To Live Better Via Less
Excerpt: These quotes from Essentialism present a hard-to-argue-with case for a better life via less. Maybe “more” isn’t what we need more of after all…
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