You Need Time To Make More Time
Everyone wants more time to study. But sometimes you have to spend time to gain time. Or in simpler words: You have to learn how to find and use time in the best possible way to match whatever way you live your life. Easy enough?
I read an interesting passage recently, which narrows the concept down:
山できこりが古いノコギリを使って 、木を切っているのを見て 、 「そんなのこぎりじゃ 、能率悪いよ 。研いだらもっと 、すぐに木を切れるようになる 」とアドバイスしたところ 、そのきこりは 、 「冗談じゃない 。自分にはそんな時間はないんだ ! 」と叫んだ
I saw a lumberjack in the mountains cutting down a tree with an old saw. I told him, “your efficiency is going to be bad with a saw like that. If you sharpen it you’ll be able to cut down trees faster.” When I told him this advice, he responded, “what, you think I have the time to sharpen my saw!?”
I liked this imagery, and it really speaks to a lot of people who want more time, but really aren’t doing what’s going to help them get that want fulfilled. The recent immersion challenge was trying to speak to that. To find the time to increase immersion, you are going to have to:
- First figure out your daily schedule
- Find what you do that wastes time
- Analyze how you are going to change it
- Come up with a plan
- Make sure to stick to it
- Work hard to fight urges to revert to old habits
And after all that, you finally get time.
Is using time to gain time worth it?
Of course. After you spend the time, you will now have an incredible increase in time for years to come. It’s just like the lumberjack, who could have spent an hour or so (or however long it takes to sharpen a saw blade) to increase the efficiency of his job. You don’t want to end up like him, where you feel pressed for time, and so busy that you never even realize in the first place what is going on.
When you have no time, it feels like you don’t even have time to think about time. This is a vicious cycle. Find the time for time. And time will smile on you with more time.
Word count for the word time in this article: 33.
Founder of Jalup. iOS Software Engineer. Former attorney, translator, and interpreter. Still watching 月曜から夜ふかし weekly since 2013.
Small typo: viscous -> vicious
どうも!
I think it’s not just finding things that “waste time”, but also finding things that could take up less time. Like if you have a hobby that is not a “waste of time” that you still want to do. Rather then spending X minutes a day on this hobby you could spend 30 less minutes a day on it.
Like for me, I still read books in English. But I make sure that the ratio of reading Japanese compared to English is good.
Agreed. It often comes down to time adjustment.
One other thing is doing your time wasters in Japanese, aka youtube for me. Once I become addicted to youtube again but this time in Japanese. My level will flourish
unsubscribing from almost all english youtube channels and replacing with japanese alternatives was huge.
And the great thing about it is that it no longer is a “time waster,” it’s a “study session.”
I agree with this point fully. However, I am like a planning addict or something. I like planning my life more than living my life. This is problematic haha.
Well you gotta live the plan sometime!
You lit a fire under my ass by zeroing in on my weak, white underbelly with this post. Got a To Do app. Check. Using it. Check. Accomplishing priorities instead of watching Hell’s Kitchen. Check. Thanks!
Nice. Master time, master all.