What Would You Do With a 25th Hour?

And how could you possibly find a 25th hour? True, there are only 24 clock hours… however, there is a tremendous variance among humans in usable hours. Note that I did not say productive hours! An exclusively productivity focus treats time as an equation; some version of “Work Accomplished = Time × Focus x Execution Speed.” Crucially, there is little in that calculation about the relative importance of the task or its relationship to our overall mission: “There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.” – Peter Drucker

How can one create an extra hour? Managing time is a misnomer, one does not manage time per se, time marches on, 60 minutes to the hour, no matter what. The key is not so much managing minutes as it is managing ourselves, our energy and focus, our commitments, attention, environment, energy, habits, and choices. The 25th hour is not found time or hours stolen from sleep or relaxation as much as it is recovered capacity. Time is rarely lost in hour long blocks, rather it slips away in increments. 

Two big black holes of time I’ve done my best to eliminate involve: 1) better decision protocols and 2) releasing. Decisions consume emotional energy; we all so very much want to make good decisions, and yet hard decisions are hard usually because they are such close calls. Once I’ve done a reasonable amount of due diligence (including sleeping on it, decisions made while rushed or weary start out handicapped), I learned to let go of the quest for the perfect decision and instead turn my energies and focus to an excellent execution.

Learning to release in general is a vital skill that frees up time and energy. While avoiding second guessing decisions is a great example (reevaluating if significant/material new evidence comes to light is not second guessing), there are many thought patters we indulge in that are self-destructive: confusing worrying with planning, catastrophizing, mentally prosecuting ourselves for past mistakes, long after any possible lessons have been retrieved and learned, replaying a conversation for hours, looking for ways you could have come across better/smarter/cooler, repeatedly mulling over a possible slight, nurturing/holding grudges or relationship ledger-keeping… the ways we sabotage ourselves are many… as are the ways we can recover our time and energy!

Closing Quotes:

“Worry is a form of fear, and all forms of fear produce fatigue.” – Bertrand Russell, 1872-1970, The Conquest of Happiness

“The myth is that there isn’t enough time. There is plenty of time. There isn’t enough focus with the time you have.” – James Clear, b. 1988, Atomic Habits

“Dost thou love Life, then do not squander Time, for that’s the Stuff Life is made of.” – Benjamin Franklin, 1706-1790, Poor Richard’s Almanack/The Way to Wealth

“Each of us has a finite reservoir of energy in any given day. Whatever amount of energy we spend obsessing about missteps we have made, decisions that do not go our way or the belief we have been treated unfairly is energy no longer available to add value in the world.” – Tony Schwartz, b. 1952 

“Most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70% of the information you wish you had. If you wait for 90%, in most cases, you’re probably being slow… If you’re good at course correcting, being wrong may be less costly than you think, whereas being slow is going to be expensive for sure.” – Jeff Bezos, b. 1964

As always, I share what I most want and need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier

Note: Every effort has been made to properly source any 3^rd person material. I am, however, a voracious reader. If anyone finds any unattributed material, pls let me know asap and I will be delighted to give credit where credit is due.
“All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749-1832