Budgeting Time and Energy from the Inside > Out
By Tana M. Mann Easton, Lead Efficiency Engineer
One of my favorite authors and podcasters, Greg McKeown, talks about how he visualizes the way people budget their time and energy. He sees the areas that we budget time and energy to as concentric circles. In the middle, the bullseye circle is self. The next ring around the bullseye is important relationships: family and close friends. The outermost ring is other: job, acquaintances, social media, TV, anything else we give our time and energy to. Greg observes that many people, when budgeting their time and energy, start from the outside of the concentric circles and move in. So their job gets first dibs on the best time and energy. And then, any time left over after working is given to family members, especially if you’re a parent. After that, if there is any time left over, then you give it to yourself.
But what if we reverse the direction and start at the inside and move our way out? Greg argues that protecting your asset (yourself) first will enhance time in the other two realms of close relationships and other relationships like your job. So instead of giving all your energy to work, coming home and having very little bandwidth left for your family and none for yourself, what if you fill yourself first? Then you enhance your relationship with your family. And then fill your other requirements.
The way that I budget my time and energy from the inside, out is to know the important buckets that I need in my days, and then figure out when I’m going to do those things in the day ahead. I do this time budgeting during my shutdown ritual every evening. So for my self, there are a few important buckets that I try to incorporate into each new day. Sleep is an important bucket. I want to make sure that I have 7-8 hours of sleep every night. So I estimate when I’ll go to bed tonight and make sure I don’t schedule anything on my calendar until 7-8 hours later. Exercise is an important bucket. I’ll look at my calendar for the next day and see when it makes sense to move my body. I like to also learn new things each day, so I often habit stack my exercise time with listening to audio books or podcasts in order to expand my knowledge base. Gratitude and meditation are practices I like to give time and energy to first thing when I wake up. And then I like to have some unfocus time in the middle of the day to dream, be creative, relax, or do whatever I most want to do during that time.
Next I’ll make sure that I have time with family on my calendar. I’ll block off time to get my son ready for school in the morning with the intention of really being present with him and not in a hurry. I’ll block off time for family in the early evening when my partner, son, and I debrief on our days together. If there are close family members and friends that I want to check on, I’ll block time to call them.
And then I’ll do my work around those self and close relationship blocks of time. This kind of calendar blocking is a bit easier now that I’m an entrepreneur and get to set my own schedule, but even when I had a 9 hour a day corporate job, I was still able to parse out time for my self and close relationships by being more deliberate about planning my time before and after work.
If you feel like you’re running on fumes or if your loved ones are dropping hints that they want to see you more, consider Greg McKeown’s advice of committing your time and energy from the inside, out. Is there one simple thing that is important to you that you could implement today (5 minutes of exercise, listen to one podcast episode, read for 10 minutes)? Is there one simple thing you could do to strengthen your relationship with your loved ones (schedule time for dinner together a couple times a week, put your phone away when you’re talking to them, really listen and be present with them when you’re together)? Budgeting my time and energy from the inside, out has helped me to feel fulfilled in my self, bonded with my family, and good at my job all at the same time. Just that simple tweak of a thought has made a world of difference for me, and I hope that it will lead to more balance in your life as well.
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Productively Yours,
Focus to Evolve Team