Living Simply: Question 8

We're a society that's always rushing, always feeling like we're behind, running some impossible race that's killing us, especially through stress and our health. We tend to let distractions derail us from what we want or should be doing.

Today's question is simply this...What makes you lose track of time?

Is it because we just drag ourselves around throughout the day? Some people manage to jump out of bed, shower, eat a quick breakfast, say hello to their family, feed the pets, and get out the door, all in about an hour or so. Others get up three hours before they need to leave. Why? Because those same tasks take that long for them to do, and they still leave late, and thus spend the day rushing to get caught up. Why? What makes people lose track of time? Here are just a few suggestions:

Could it be too much time fighting the inevitable? You know you need to get up for work, or an appointment, or to take care of your family - but do you waste time in bed, literally a long time, just "wishing you didn't have to get up"? Wishing for half an hour could be potentially killing you.

Social media overload - are you late because you went into the bathroom with your phone and instead of just spending a few minutes there, you wasted an extra 15 - 20 minutes just so you could scroll through Facebook, reacting to some political rant, or watching some video of something useless but seems entertaining in the moment? That's 15 - 20 minutes you've lost. It's not coming back. What could you get done if you had an extra 3 1/2 hours a week? Take a class? Learn a new skill? Read a book that would help you improve yourself? Spend it with a person you say you care about and is desperate for time with you but you're "too busy"? Don't put off important things with time-wasters.

Maybe you're into video games. I know they can be used to relieve stress, or take your mind off work, or people think it's a way to be in a relationship with friends who game with you online, but when those games consume time daily, when you've lost hours and hours of your evening while your friends and family are sitting beside you lonely, you're falling behind instead of moving ahead, it's just an excuse and it's wasting your time.

Life goes by quickly. You only get one shot at this. To build the simple life you want, you have to intentionally choose to drop the time wasters from your life. You have to use your time wisely. I'm not saying don't take time to rest, relax, or play. What I'm saying, is don't waste the precious gift of time, because no one on their deathbed wished they'd spent more time at the office, playing games, or scrolling through Facebook. They regret not spending time with family when they had the chance. They regret traveling. They regret learning a new skill. Don't wait until it's too late. Be intentional with your time.