Seeking out the dead space - so you don't have to get up at 430am

Don’t lose precious sleep fretting over whether you too should be getting up at 430am like all the other overachievers to ensure you’ve aligned your shakras, run a marathon and written your memoir before everyone else is out of bed (and posted it all on the ‘grams).

There’s a better way. Cut the slack.

I’ve never been a fan of those posts about ‘imagine you had a bank account with $10,080, well that’s how many minutes are in a week and you’re spending them one dollar at a time, blah , blah , blah’. They always devolve into some bright-eyed missive about seeing more sunrises and clocking up more instagrammable moments with your kids. All well and good but in the real world the bills still have to get paid, deadlines still exist, relationships need time and effort, you still need work.

As Neil Gaiman puts it, ‘Every hour wounds, the last one kills’. So yes, our time is finite, but before you run out and create the world’s most amazing colour-coded sticker chart on how you will allocate it perhaps just focus on thing – not wasting it.

If it’s work time then work – like really work. Work your face off.

If it’s family time then be relentlessly present, throw the phone away, look your kids or partner in the eyes and commit. Tell me more, sure I’ve got time, I’d would love to play Uno for the 432nd time today.

If it’s ‘you time’ then get after it, I don’t care if you’re meditating or going full clang-and-bang in the gym. Just don’t half arse it.

The greatest sin is slumping on the couch flicking through the socials because you can’t be bothered figuring out what else to do. The primary sin is in wasting your time. Chatting to the kids whilst simultaneously scrolling – what a heinous devaluing of your relationship. Checking the emails before you go to bed – trust me, they emailed because it wasn’t urgent – if the building was in flames they’d call. It might feel like you’re some multi-tasking ninja but in reality, you’re probably just screwing up both jobs.

Focus on eliminating the waste, the dead space, before you start worrying about everything else. Do that and then see just how much more time you have to play with.