“Is this worth doing?”
It’s the question to end all questions because our answers must acknowledge that great equalizer:
TIME.
It’s not hard deciding what we want our lives to be about, but it is hard to decide what we’re willing to give up to make what we want to be true for ourselves a reality.
I am an Enneagram 5, and the deadly sin of an Enneagram 5 is greed.
We are hoarders.
And the one thing I hoard more than anything else is time. Ask me for anything, ANYTHING, and I will gladly hand it over, but if you ask me for my time, sadly, I’ll need a minute to think about it.
Confession: I AM THE WORST.
This past Friday, I looked at the calendar and saw that I had an entirely free day on my hands.
So unusual!
So perfect!
A “me” day!
Drop off this kids at school, swing by the gym, and still have time to enjoy a full seven hours to myself! I was giddy with excitement.
But no sooner had I hopped off the rower than my oldest daughter, who’s away at college, called me and said she was sick. A trip to the grocery store to get cold medicine, a morning at the stove making soup, and time in the car driving to her place followed.
I should have been grateful. I had a free day, after all. I didn’t have to cancel anything in order to make caring for her a priority.
(Writing that last sentence even makes me sick. Selfishness is real.)
And I am a mom. It’s my job to take care of my kids.
I wasn’t upset, but the whole thing really made me reevaluate my relationship with time.
And specifically with interruptions.
Because an interruption doesn’t have to be a disruption.
In writing as in life, there’s a couple of ways to express interruption. In addition to that favorite of writers everywhere (the parentheses), you may remember learning in elementary school about another way to express interruption—the interjection! An interjection is fun to write, but even more fun to say aloud because you can be loud! Words like "Hey!” and “Ouch!” and “Good grief!” You probably learned a few more on the schoolbus. I think I learned all my bad words (ahem—interjections—from 80s movies).
The word interjection comes from the Latin words inter (between) and jacĕre (to throw). So, an interjection is a word that you throw in between sentences or thoughts to express a sudden feeling. (Source)
And that’s what last Friday felt like for me. It felt like this interruption came in between the things I had already planned, and suddenly I felt frustrated. I wanted to yell all the interjections!
“The opposite of love is not hate; it’s efficiency.”
We praise efficiency, like it’s the end all, be all of time management skills.
Be more productive!
Save more time!
Optimize resources!
And okay, I guess that’s true.
In business.
But did someone really say that the opposite of love is efficiency?
Yes. Yes, they did. In life—if efficiency is the goal, then you’ve got a real values problem.
Your choices reflect your values and always say something about who you are as a person. So every time you say yes to something (a job, meeting, errand, snack, TV show, game, etc.), you are assigning value to that thing.
And we only assign value to the things that reflect our own values.
So where does that leave taking care of my daughter on a Friday afternoon?
That really hit home for me. Literally. IT HIT HOME.
The time I spent doing that was infinitely more valuable than anything else I could have chosen to do on my “free day.”
An investment in others always involves time.
And there’s other benefits too: time spent doing the things you love with the people you love expands your imagination and transforms your life (Thank you, Elizabeth Gilbert!). It’s the experience of being together that adds value to your life.
We all struggle to manage our time effectively.
I have to imagine even if you don’t hoard it,
you waste it
you kill it
you take it for granted
you lose track of it
you make up for it
you press it
And I don’t want that for you.
I want you to understand that every time you give away a moment of your time, you are giving away a valuable piece of yourself. And that’s important. Because whether you have a million bucks in the bank or you owe your landlord $1,000 for last month’s rent, the hour-for-hour value exchange is the same. And when you ask yourself that all-important question, “Is this worth doing?” I hope you discover that whenever your answer involves people, the answer is yes.
A resounding yes! A thousand times yes!
People are always worth our time.
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Tell me about your own relationship with time. I’d love to know!