5 Time hacks I wish I knew when I was younger

Time. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.

You can lose your money, your house, your job. But you can get those back. Time on the other hand; once it’s gone, it’s gone.

We all get the same amount in a day. How we use it, however, varies greatly. In a world of distractions, responsibilities, and human necessities, how do you make the most of this precious commodity?

How you spend your days is up to you. But maximizing your time could be the difference between living a life of monotony, and following your passion. Between succeeding in all your endeavors, and being burnt out before you’ve even started. Between spending lots of quality time with friends and family, and seeing your life pass too quickly before your eyes.

The better you use your time, the more of it you have. Here are 5 things I’ve recently learned that are now shaping the way I navigate my life.

The 2-minute rule

Your day is made up of countless things to do. Anything from 2-second tasks like opening the curtains to 8-hour drives to a neighboring state. You may not know how long certain tasks will take, but you can usually estimate the ones that can be done quickly.

When you put off doing small tasks that can be accomplished rather quickly, they tend to add up and eat into your precious time later.

The 2-minute rule, originally from David Allen’s Getting things done, says that if a task can be done in 2 minutes or less, do it immediately.

Stuff like washing a dish after using it, making your bed, and answering a text can all be done rather quickly. The more these tasks add up without being done, the more they pile up and take away from larger tasks that need more energy and focus.

Following this rule helps you eliminate a lot of your procrastination because consciously acknowledging whether a task will take less than 2 minutes puts each one into perspective. As you knock off every quick task you come across, your mind and environment are being freed up of all the clutter that would otherwise slowly build up and be compounded.

The 80/20 rule

• You use 20% of the clothes you have, 80% of the time.
• You use 20% of the roads in your area, 80% of the time.
• You use 20% of the apps on your phone for 80% of your activity.
• 20% of your customers account for 80% of the revenue.

And so on.

This rule (also known as the Pareto Principle) states that for most things in life, roughly 20% of the input into something amounts to 80% of the result. Understanding this principle allows you to contextualize the effort you put into any task and helps you prioritize your time and energy.

So what does this look like on a day to day basis?

Let’s take your to-do list at the start of the day, for example. Using this rule, roughly 2 out of 10 tasks will lead to 80% of the impact. Spending time on the bigger fish (the items that produce the largest results) may take a bit more time, but will yield the most fruit.

Sometimes you can cross off a number of small things from your list but have little to show for it at the end of the day. That’s because you haven’t prioritized the most time-efficient tasks.

Being a perfectionist can sometimes mean you spend hours and hours to make sure every detail is the best it possibly can be. And sometimes this is necessary. But often, after you’ve input 20% of the work to produce 80% of the result, the remaining time you spend trying to perfect it may have much less of an impact. Certainly in terms of the work going into it.

Using this mental model to plan and reflect on which activities will lead to the greatest output, helps you make efficient use of your time and certainly makes you feel more productive.

Energy matters more than time

Your energy usually dissipates as you go through your day. Your focus, motivation, stress, and body activity slowly sap your energy to a point where you simply want to relax and give your mind a rest.

In a busy world with 9–5 jobs, long commutes, long hours of study, and a constant avalanche of digital distractions, noting your energy levels is essential to productivity and time-saving.

The leftover time you have at the end of the day means very little if you are too exhausted and drained to make full use of it.

Many times over the last few years I decided to learn a new skill or start on a project, only to give up almost immediately. At the end of the day, after work, I had no energy to sit down in front of a screen and focus.

Recently, however, I decided to start waking up an hour or two earlier than usual. I’m the most productive first thing in the morning. I’m not really a morning person, but once I get over the initial ‘dear-lord-5-more-minutes-please’ I'm able to get some work done before I go off to work and start my day. That way, by getting some work done when my energy levels are best, I tend to feel less guilty when I’m tired later on and can spend my lazy time doing more relaxed tasks.

You may be a night owl. You may be more creative on an empty stomach. You may have the most energy after a long day cooped up in the office. Whatever the case may be, try to focus on your energy levels and plan your day to use those times to your advantage.

Say No to time bullies

This one comes down to priority. There are plenty of things you can fill your time with. Work, education, entertainment, relationships, and hobbies to name a few. Some are necessary. Some are beneficial. Some are useless, even destructive.

If you feel like you don’t have time to do everything you’d like to, chances are there are a few things you could sacrifice to make time.

Time bullies are the people, activities, and choices you make, that prevent you from having the time to do the productive and sometimes essential things you need and want to do.

Browsing through social media feeds, watching pointless videos, and sometimes even excessive socializing are examples of activities that eat up into the time you could spend on learning, growing, and improving your health.

Whatever your goals may be, whatever lifestyle you want to live, whatever you want to learn, if something is important enough to you, you can always make the time for it.

Be conscious of the time bullies that eat into your day and prevent you from doing the things that make you feel fulfilled.

Identify them. Start saying no. Prioritize. You’ll be a lot happier.

Be present

This one may not really be a hack. But it’s something I definitely find important and am learning to do.

As a society with a shrinking attention span, surrounded by constant ‘noise’ and a large quantity of knowledge and information to digest, it’s getting harder and harder to be present.

Being present doesn’t just apply to the focus you have on a task, but also the relationships with your friends and family.

Putting effort into being present in every moment, whether it’s concentrating on your work proposal, listening to your child talk about their day, or even taking a moment to enjoy the sunset, really makes the most use of time.

From a practical standpoint, avoiding distractions and focusing on one task at a time allows for better output, as compared to the multi-tasking we tend to think we can do. Switching from your phone to your essay, to chatting, back to your phone, back to your essay, tends to result in low productivity for each item. Your mind keeps switching and isn’t able to dedicate its best to each.

But beyond the pragmatic applications, being present allows you to connect more deeply with what you do. To build better relationships. To find joy in the day to day things. To appreciate everything around you. To truly make good use of your time.

The above is by no means a comprehensive list of ways to manage your time. Just a few tricks, mindsets, and beliefs that I have found to really transform the way I now maneuver through life.

Had I known these years ago, I may have been able to accomplish more. They at least would have helped. They help me now. I hope they help you too.