time choice - The Time Finder with Paula Eder

The Time Finder with Paula Eder

The way you use your time is the way you live your life.

Find Time to Keep Yourself Focused and on Track with This One Simple Tip!

Posted on May 21, 2012 by Paula, under Time and Technology.

Finding time to stay on track, especially if much of your work must be done on-line, can be a very big challenge. There are so many potential distractions that can pull you away from your planned work. Do you notice that you ‘lose time’ when you’re at your computer? It’s a very common problem and may well be your biggest time drain.

But don’t worry! Here’s one simple and sure-fire way to keep yourself focused and on track when you sit down to work at your computer: Use a timer!

There really is no better way to create time boundaries for yourself so that you can stay focused and on-track. There are lots of different kinds of timers that you can use – some on-line and some of the egg-timer variety. Both can work just fine; I personally prefer the egg-timer type, as I can use it to stay on track, not just at the computer, but when I’m doing other things around the house an farm.

For accomplishing tasks that require a lot of focus, I like to set the timer for no more than 20 or 30-minutes. Then, when it goes off, I get up and walk around a little bit, or do some stretches. It’s important to give yourself frequent “movement breaks” when your work is primarily sedentary. This refreshes your body and your mind, enabling you to return to your task with renewed energy.

I think you’ll find that your ability to stay on track is greatly enhanced when you work in shorter increments and give yourself clear boundaries. You’ll begin to establish a rhythm that both your body and your mind will appreciate.

Not only that, but the more you know that YOU are in charge of your time, the more you can stay focused and on track. As you use your timer to create and maintain your time boundaries you build self-trust around time management and time choices. This makes it easier to let go of that tempting website that you want to explore ‘right now’ – because you know that you will find time to return to it later. Clear time boundaries make that possible for you!

And, here’s something more to consider. Are you an entrepreneur, consultant, or small business owner who’s ready to take the next big step? If you want to learn how to create and to keep a successful business running on your own, then this is for you! “How to Create Credibility as a Freelancer” is a booklet with 70 expert-proven tips that will help you recharge your energy and motivation, increase your visibility, and sharpen those vital organizational and time management skills.

Success is within your reach, so don’t wait, http://optimize.thetimefinder.com/tips-booklet/ and get started today!

Let’s explore time together …

Disclosure of Material Connection: I have no material connection with any of the resources mentioned here, and have not received any compensation for writing this content.

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Finding Time for Decisiveness and Productivity with Priority Power™

Posted on April 25, 2012 by Paula, under Time Choices, Time Priorities.

Finding time and using it well becomes so much easier when you are clear about your priorities and give yourself permission to be decisive about following through on them. That’s what I call Priority Power™!

What needs to change from day to day? What’s indispensable?

You see, the power lies entirely in your hands. You’re the one who decides. And it’s a back-and-forth process, in that your decisions shape your priorities, and then your priorities can skillfully shape future decisions.

Building Priority Power™ can help you right from square one, as you create an ideal start to your day. With your priorities in place, you know your path and everything that’s likely to be on it. Even setbacks and surprises feel more manageable, because you’re familiar with the factors you need to weigh.

Sounds rewarding, doesn’t it?

Prioritizing is a Heart-Based Time Management™ Tool. It links your heart, your mind, and your responsiveness to ongoing change. Here are some benefits you enjoy when you proactively and consistently prioritize:

You feel safe. When you calmly weigh your options, your time choices are grounded and realistic.

You feel relaxed. When your priorities are clear, you have made your peace with what comes first and what might need to wait.

Your time is uncluttered. When you prioritize, you simplify. The more you exercise decisiveness, the stronger your “prioritizing muscles” become.

You feel confident. Your skill at prioritizing helps you stay nimble as new situations arise.

You experience inner abundance. You know, right down to your toes, that fulfillment arises from heart-based prioritizing. So you commit to use your time accordingly.

In upcoming posts, we’ll explore other aspects of Priority Power™ and how you can positively enjoy its role in your life! And, in the meantime, I’d love to know how you increase your decisiveness and productivity? Are there particular practices or tools that you find helpful?

And are there time topics that you’d like to read more about here? Please feel invited to drop me a line – I’d love to hear from you and serve your time finding needs!

So, want to learn more about how you can expand and deepen your time and efforts … in whatever areas you choose? Here’s a great way to explore avenues to increasing your time skills and heart-based power – whether it’s in your business, or your personal life. I am so pleased to be able to offer my expertise and support as The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to “Time Management”.

You can visit by clicking the link, and when you do you’ll find lots of time management articles by experts in the field, along with a vibrant and welcoming on-line community. Stop by my Expert Page and leave a comment or question … or just say hello. There are lots of ways to connect … let’s get started!

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Finding Time to Stop Living Someone Else’s Life

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Paula, under Time Choices, Time Priorities.

Finding time to follow your dreams may require waking up first. How many automatic time choices are embedded in your life from childhood? If you did the exercise in yesterday’s post, you may have been amazed at the messages you were carrying.

It’s very helpful and important to spot these early default settings. That’s because unexamined patterns can set you up to be living someone else’s life.

And the thing is, your life is unique – never before and never again to be. What a loss, to not live out that uniqueness to its fullest!

Unconsciously repeating patterns you learned from someone else is like trying to wear someone else’s running shoes for a marathon. It isn’t going to help you finish the race. Just so with your time legacy. However well your family’s time choices may have suited them, they probably don’t fully address your needs.

If there are places where you can feel your time choices hobbling you, those are what I like to call Time Traps. Those ‘stuck places’ usually hold treasures of information, for those who choose to explore.

So, why not start rethinking a habitual Time Trap right now? These 3 simple steps provide a jumping off place:

Name one time choice that frustrates you.
Quickly describe how it conflicts with your conscious values.
Compare it with what family members did with their time in similar situations.

Following these steps gives you key information about how your Time Trap first took root. As you connect the dots between your troubled time choice and your upbringing, fresh ideas may pop up. Your explorations energize and empower you – as you awaken into your own, unique life!

And here’s a lesson you can carry with you wherever you go: Self-consciousness and self-criticism lose ground when you’re genuinely curious and motivated to learn. This is a powerful reframing of perspective that can absolutely transform all of your choices, explorations and discoveries. It’s a proactive, heart-based approach that puts you in the driver’s seat, no matter what challenge you are greeting!

Are you interested in learning more about the Heart-Based Time Management™ Path? Here’s one way that you can transform and deepen your relationship to time in the Heart-Based Way … I invite you to explore Secrets of Heart-Based Time Management™ – my chapter in the book I co-authored - Stepping Stones to Success! In it I share my proven system for exploring and harnessing the power of your mind, your body and your spirit to help you deepen your experience of time and of your life.

As you work with the ideas I offer, you’ll explore your patterns, clarify your values, identify and prioritize your goals … and create your path for achieving them. You can give yourself the gift of this wonderful resource today, and get started on your journey toward success, Stepping Stone by Stepping Stone …just click this link to get the details!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to “Hear” the Actions Beneath the Words (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Be Yourself, Respect Yourself, and Do What You Can: 3 Timely Tips-Part 1 (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Uncover Your Time Legacy: What Do You Carry into Your Present from Your Past? (thetimefinder.com)

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Find Time to Uncover Your Time Legacy: What Do You Carry into Your Present from Your Past?

Posted on February 28, 2012 by Paula, under Time Choices, Time Transformation.

Finding time to discover the childhood roots of your current relationship with time can be hugely rewarding! Indeed, there are many things that we inherit from our families, and uncovering your time legacy, so that you can make conscious choices about what to keep and what to leave behind, will be at once enlightening and freeing for you.

There may be any number of ways that you adopted an approach to time that you learned long ago and that now works against you. But the good news is that your parents’ time priorities don’t have to be your destiny – not if you engage in some detective work!

So, today I invite you to explore just how you may have come to live someone else’s priorities. When you start by seeing your history with clarity and compassion, you can accept where you are. This, in turn, gives you a solid base, as you then make choices to transform your relationship with time!

To start with, as a child, you were profoundly influenced by your family’s time choices. They taught you important messages about values – what’s important and what isn’t.

Take a minute or two, right now, to recall the family in which you grew up. How did each adult in your household spend time? Create a vivid picture in your mind of how they lived out their priorities, one day after another. Sense the fundamental and personal beliefs that guided their choices. Let the picture take shape and fill itself out.

Next, quickly jot down a few observations about their use of time.

What came first?
What came last?
What message does this give you about their values?
How do your values align with theirs?

Your answers to these questions provide you with a good starting point for exploring your current time choices. You may want to revisit this exercise to flesh out more and more details over time. As you explore, you will illuminate patterns – some of which are helpful and some which you may want to change. This is your time legacy.

So stay tuned, as we continue to explore this truly fundamental element in your approach to your time. Clarifying the elements of your time legacy gives you a powerful key to transforming your relationship with time.

And in the meantime, want to learn more about how you can expand and deepen your time and efforts … in whatever areas you choose? Here’s a great way to explore avenues to increasing your time skills and heart-based power – whether it’s in your business, or your personal life. I am so pleased to be able to offer my expertise and support as The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to “Time Management”.

Finding Time by Growing Your Courage Incrementally: Today’s Timely Tip! (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Build Your Brave Muscles With a Daily Courage Workout (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Know the State of YOUR Union: Are Your Head and Heart in Sync for Success? (thetimefinder.com)

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Find Time to Put a Little Love in Your Heart

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Paula, under Time and Energy, Time Boundaries.

Finding time for love is important. We can probably all agree on that. Yet in our busy everyday lives, love isn’t something that often has a slot on our To Do Lists. So, not surprisingly, it can get lost in the shuffle.

We focus on it at times … like Valentine’s Day … but then more pressing things intrude. Sound familiar?

And yet, finding time to put a little love in your heart is a foundational time choice that is key to your (and my) heart-based journey. It’s the underpinning to everything else that we do, whether it’s serving clients, spending time with friends and family, or (maybe most importantly) spending some time alone.

A heart that holds compassion can hold anything!

And the good news is that letting love into our hearts doesn’t take a lot of time – what it takes is creating some space for yourself and simply opening. (And opening your heart is a skill that you can develop and hone, with practice.)

Creating that space requires boundaries. It may not take a lot of time, but it does require some, so setting boundaries is key to giving yourself the opportunity to open. As I’ve shared in other posts, you need to be able to say “No” (i.e. have boundaries) in order to say “Yes”!

I’m very excited to be speaking at the Mompreneur Mojo 2012 Virtual Convention today about how “Unbeatable Heart-Based Boundary Tips Keep You Moving Easily Through Your Busy Day.” Sign up and tune in to learn more about how boundaries can help you create the life you want for yourself! It’s FREE and it’s going to be great!

And, in the meantime, set some boundaries and take a quiet moment today to open your heart with love and compassion. See what happens. See what changes. I know you’ll be refreshed and I think you’ll be surprised by what comes to you!

Let’s explore time together …

Find Time to Be Yourself, Respect Yourself, and Do What You Can: 3 Timely Tips-Part 1 (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Celebrate and Feel Grateful (thetimefinder.com)
Find Time to Create Quiet-Some Timely Thoughts (thetimefinder.com)

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Find Time for January’s Time Finder Favorites

Posted on February 7, 2012 by Paula, under Time After Time.

Finding time to look back at the start of a new month is always refreshing and energizing … and this month is no different as we look back at January’s Time Finder Favorites!

Here’s a sampling of our top posts from the past month, based on YOUR votes (visits)!

Finding Time for Google Plus – Timely Resources This Cyber Monday came in at #1 – just as it seems to be doing on the web! Have you tried it yet? What do you think of it?

With the power of Google behind it, it’s hard to see how anyone wanting to boost his or her presence on the web could NOT jump on the Google Plus bandwagon. While there remain controversies about how Google Plus is embedded in Google search results, it seems clear that this is a social-networking tool that is going to stick around (unlike some earlier attempts by Google).

Self Care was the topic for our second-most-read post: Find Time to Give Yourself Exactly What You Need Every Single Day!

How often do you feel like you’re running against a stopwatch and depleting yourself in the process?

Don’t you sometimes wish that someone would come along and give you whatever it is that you need in that moment?

Well, the good news is, that “someone” is YOU!

Find Time to Nourish Your Courage with Love: Today’s Timely Tip was your third favorite post, followed closely by some other courage posts:

Here’s one timely passage from that last post – about moving ahead by letting go. A thought for today:

Finding time is all about saying No to one thing to say Yes to another, as I often say. The No that you say to one thing is what actually makes your Yes to something else possible, and meaningful. It’s all about how you make your time choices.

So, let’s pause for a moment. How do you feel about your time choices so far today? Don’t come from a critical place or you’ll clam up. Just let yourself feel.

Are there choices you’d like to change? Most of us are going to say yes to that … but before you start thinking about how you want to change those choices, let’s pause again.

Ask yourself, what is it that, for YOU, leads you to want to change how you use your time?

Want to learn more about how you can expand and deepen your time and efforts … in whatever areas you choose? Here’s a great way to explore avenues to increasing your time skills and heart-based power – whether it’s in your business, or your personal life. I am so pleased to be able to offer my expertise and support as The Official SelfGrowth.com Guide to “Time Management”.