In search of the twenty five hour day

For some of you the following will be revision, so I apologise in advance. For others, it may be a relevant and timely message. Pun intended.

Timing

Yes, we’ve spoken about the ‘time thing’ before on this site but recent conversations, emails and questions tell me that too many people still believe that success or failure, is largely determined by hours in the day and/or this mysterious and hard-to-master thing called timing. For some people, apparently good timing is the key to achieving most things. And silly old me thought success was more about making decisions, using our ability, doing stuff and managing the time we have effectively. It seems that no amount of information, inspiration, education or motivation is enough to get some people past the intention and planning stage, and into the doing and producing stage; the results stage.

The mystical right time

Ever noticed how some people live their life in a holding pattern, perpetually waiting for the mystical right time to change their reality, or part thereof (career, health, relationships, destructive habits), yet mysteriously that time never seems to arrive? Talk to them on any given day and they are always about to re-invent themselves. Always about to do something huge, spectacular and life-changing. Always at the threshold of greatness – in their mind anyway. Pity they never actually get off their asses. Plenty of thinking, talking, planning, postulating, philosophizing and of course waiting, but as a rule, very little action.

They would do it of course, but amazingly it just never seems to be the right time for them. Some people have been planning for decades – if only they’d plan less, wait less and do more, they might see some real results. If success was built on intentions, they’d be incredible and if life was a theory they’d be living the dream right now but sadly, they’re still only dreaming the dream.

What’s it really about?

Many of us live under the illusion that creating positive change in our world is in fact largely about the right timing. I’m here to tell you that for the most part, it ain’t. It’s waaaaay more about attitude, choices and behaviour than it will ever be about timing (i.e. spending forever waiting for the ‘ideal’ time). When it comes to creating our best life and changing our situation for the better, timing is an issue (one of many) but it certainly isn’t the key determinant of success or failure. If you have everything else in place (including ideal timing) but you go into that change process with a bad attitude, you will produce results which will fall somewhere in the average to disastrous range. Sometimes we simply have to make it the right time or make the most of the time we have.

It’s all in your head

By the way, the only place that too much or too little time exists is in our head. Time is time; we all have the same allocation but some of us simply use it better. It’s one of the few things in life which doesn’t change. It’s neither good nor bad, right nor wrong, too much or too little; it just is. But we choose to give it the good and bad, right and wrong labels in order to justify our lack of results and our lack of doing. Funny how people will blame their lack of results and inability to change on ‘bad timing’ but never blame it on their bad attitude. Or their procrastination. Or lack of consistency. Or fear of failure. Or laziness. They will wheel out the ‘time’ excuse because it’s convenient and it takes the pressure off them (in their mind). In the course of my work I’ve heard the following sentence (or similar) thousands of times:

“For me, it’s a timing thing – now is not a great time.”

There are two key time excuses:

1. I don’t have enough time

2. Now is not the right time for me

These excuses might be valid periodically but not day in, day out, year in, year out! Nope. While all the timing people are waiting for the planets to align, the kids to finish school, the weather to get warmer and for a few things to miraculously fall into place (as they do), the attitude people are out there doing what needs to be done and creating amazing results. Some people maximise their time, some people waste it and some people even blame it.

Which group are you in?

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