Knowing Yourself Starts with Your Time Choices

values
Knowing yourself means knowing what’s important to you.

Knowing yourself is a foundational goal for human beings. And often it’s framed as a very difficult and elusive goal.

But I like to think of knowing yourself as fundamentally about learning what’s important to you.

Finding time for what matters most is the core goal of my Heart-Based Time Management system. So, with all the responsibilities and demands of modern life, how you figure out “what matters most”?  

Well, knowing yourself is key because if you don’t know what is important to you, it’s very hard to focus your time on it.

Start here…

What’s important to you is going to be reflected in the choices you make about your time. So observing your choices seems the best place to start.

Some time ago I read an interesting post titled “When You Say “I Didn’t Have Time” I Hear . . .” The author, Marquita (Marty) Herald proposes that we can see what’s important to us by looking at how we spend our time.

“The way you spend your time is the way you live your life,” as we like to say here at The Time Finder.  And Marty’s post explores the useful information our time choices communicate to us if we listen.  

Knowing yourself through your choices…

When you simply look at how you spend your time, what emerges from that raw data is some very accurate information about what you are valuing.  As she notes:

People love to talk about the things they’re going to do and the places they will go, but then don’t take any actions to realize those goals. Very often inaction is chalked up to being too busy, when what it really means is it’s just not THAT important, even though people don’t dare admit it.

The challenge, in listening to ourselves and assimilating the information we have at our fingertips, is often a matter of filtering. We need to filter out the “should’s” and “have-to’s” and other messages that tell us what ought-to-be important to us.  

These messages lead to an awful lot of guilt and unhappiness. And they also make it difficult to hear what we really do hold important.

Clear out critical messages.

I think of those critical messages as annoying static.  The more you recognize them and set them aside, the more likely you are to come to recognize your own clear voice. And by extension, that helps you see your own values.  

Clearing out the self-criticism, you begin to see your time choices as information, clear and simple.  Once you’ve gathered some baseline information about what you do with your time, then Marty has some excellent advice about next steps:

Try investing some time in measuring your emotional connection to what you do now, decide what you really want, and take some steps to move in that direction. Still not sure? A really good exercise to help you focus is to pretend you’ve lived your life and are looking back over what you accomplished in your lifetime. If you find your goals are still important to you, then it’s time to work on re-establishing your daily priorities.

Clearing out the “should’s” and then looking at how you actually spend your time is powerful. It gives you a strong foundation for coming back to your goals and aspirations from a self-referenced place.  Your time choices will have more flow and congruence. And that will free up your energy in ways that will gratify, and may well surprise you.

Here’s more help for clearing out criticism and knowing yourself:

We all have voices that chatter at us throughout the day. The Inner Critic is one of them. Learning to recognize (and counter) this destructive voice is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself.

You see, the Inner Critic is a negative, debilitating and constant presence in your life.  And it’s not just the words. It’s the judgmental tone, the rolling eyes, and the scolding wag of the index finger. Beyond sapping your energy and confidence, your Inner Critic robs you of time and profoundly distorts how you see others and how you feel about yourself. So, what can you do? 

Give yourself a big boost with my Exercise and Guide Book titled “These Critical Voices Are Driving Me Crazy!” How to Use Positive Self-Talk to Save Your Sanity and Your Time! Part of my popular Voices Package, this E-Guide offers simple, practical exercises, checklists and tips for learning to recognize and counter the critical voices that disrupt and hurt you.

“This guidebook is by a secret genius as far as I’m concerned.
Her name is Paula Eder and she is absolutely brilliant
when it comes to how to be in relationship with self and
how to be in relationship with time.”
Heather Dominick 
http://BusinessMiracles.com/

You hold the power to make conscious choices about the kinds of messages you give yourself. As you exercise this power, you’ll develop new clarity and confidence – and transform your time.

“These Critical Voices Are Driving Me Crazy!” opens the door and gives you a roadmap, so don’t wait. Click this link to learn more about the Voices Package and get started on your empowering journey today.

Let’s explore time together…

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