Book Review: Four Thousand Weeks Time Management For Mortals by Oliver Burkeman

I used to think of time management as a tool to accomplish the most amount of work in the most efficient manner. This book is not about that type of time management. It's not about productivity. Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman is an eye opening look at managing the time in our lives by choosing to spend our time doing the things that are really important to us instead of saying, "Oh I will work on my passion when I have more free time." So many people put off what they really want to do and then never get to it.

The average person lives approximately 4,000 weeks and that of course is if you're lucky to live into your 80s. That doesn't really seem like very many weeks.

If you have a dream, start working on it now.

I'm more than half done with my 4,000 weeks. I only have about 1296 weeks left. Maybe I'll have a little more time as I have two grandparents that lived into their 90s and my mom at 82 is still going strong. But the point is you never really know.

My task is to think about how I really want to spend what I do have left. Some people think this is a depressing way to think, or that it means you have to be working all the time. I see it more as liberating. Thinking about it makes me at least a little more present and grateful each day. Maybe some days I still want to sit back and watch some football with my husband, spend a day writing, or take a nice long nap, but the point is that I want to be consciously making those decisions instead of mindlessly going through the motions each day. I want to be present and choose what is important to me each moment.

What will you choose to do more of?

Kathy:)

I'm Sick of My Phone

 

The other day, I got an alert on my phone: 

You spent an average of 4 hours and 30 minutes daily on your phone last week. Congratulations, that's down from last week's average.

Instantly, I wanted to throw my phone.  That number couldn't be correct. I'm not on it that much. I clicked to see the breakdown. 

There it was, right in front of me, my daily breakdown of cellphone usage.  Sunday, I spent 3 hours reading news. Monday, it was productivity and finance. In my head, I tried to rationalize that one-I was accomplishing things. One day, I spent 2.5 hours on the Social category. Every day there was something that drew me in for hours to that little screen attached to my body.

I'm 52 years old, I've lived 2,704 weeks. According to the book 4,000 Weeks by Robert Boseman, which says the average person lives only about 4,000 weeks, about 77 years, I only have 1,296 left. Of course, I had to use my phone's calculator to figure that out. 

Do I really want to spend my remaining weeks on my phone for 4 hours a day? That seems like such a waste. Especially, when I think about my first 35 years when I had no portable phone at all. I was still able to work, keep up with my friends and family, and know what was going on in the world. 

Sure my iPhone 11 makes a lot of things easier. Texting multiple friends, family members, and clients in a day is super quick and easy. Now I can carry 5,000 photos, 2,000 videos, and countless books literally in my pocket. I can keep up with Breaking News as it is happening no matter where I am. Most importantly for me, a navigationally impaired person, I have a map with me at all times. 

But does that make it better? Am I really more productive now that I can eliminate every moment of boredom? Am I living a happier more meaningful life?