Beyond Tracking Your Time (To Engage High Value Activities)

If you have read my previous post, you'll gather that it is propelled by a key question: How do you reduce time spent on low-value activities in favour of optimal engagement in high-value activities [1]?

The answer I proposed was simple: Track your time.

The power of this activity is triple fold: It (1) presents you with feedback about activities you are giving time, which activates your faculty that (2) exercises intention in the decision process required for switching between activities, and this (3) keeps you stirred towards engaging activities that bring high value.

To the effort of optimising your engagement in high value activity, tracking your time offers a boost with supreme effectiveness. However, its effectiveness depends on a feature that needs upkeep: Being intentional.

The thing about being intentional is that it requires intrinsic resources, like energy and focus. And intrinsic resources, as with any resource, tends to wane from use. Without intention the effect offered by tracking your time breaks down.

For a person who gives time to low-value activities, and intends to curb those activities in favour of investing in high-value activities, tracking time only presents a fit to a piece of the puzzle that is: what have you done with your time? There is another piece of the puzzle to which if left unattended undermines intention and the benefits derived from time tracking. That piece is: what makes sense to do, given the time that remains?

To give thought to the question - what makes sense to do, given the time that remains - is to take a proactive approach when your intention is rich in preparation for times when you might find yourself low on intention.

It can be useful to keep in mind a quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin: "By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail." The way to keep low value activities from diminishing efforts towards the good life is to be clear what those activities are and to incorporate them into your life, with intention.

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1. The terms "low-value" and "high-value" activities are adopted straight out of Cal Newport's brilliant book titled Digital Minimalism. Here are in meaning (in my words):

• Low-value activities: Activities of which sustained engagement (have potential to) diminish efforts for making a good life good. E.g., binge watching YouTube videos.
• High-value activity: Activities of which sustained engagement (have potential to) boost efforts for making a good life good. E.g., journaling, as an exercise to unraveling complex life situations.

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Be remarkable!