Leadership – I’m Too Busy To Follow My DreamsToo often I hear people say I would love to do this, or I would love to do that, but I am just too busy, I don’t have the time.
Even worse I have often used this excuse myself.
The first time I was asked to run in a Marathon Relay, just a 10 k run, I couldn’t find the time to train. But the reality was it just wasn’t important enough for me, I prioritised other things ahead of it.
In today’s world where we are always on, always connected, we seem to be busier than ever, with little or no time for anything else.
But in all honesty, this is just rubbish.
It’s so easy to be busy, a hamster running on a wheel is busy, but that doesn’t mean this time is productive, that we couldn’t prioritise unproductive busy time and use that to follow our dreams.
When I finally found the right motivation to run a Marathon, raising money for cancer charity, I found it dead easy to find the time to train. That hour in the morning between getting up and going to work, instead of watching news on TV, I could go out and run.
It was more important for me run, than it was to listen to gossip TV.
Yet before I couldn’t find the time, I was serious about that too, I really believed it.
If we are serious about our dreams then we need to make them important enough for us to drop busy times, which are in fact wasting time, to follow our dreams.
I know you’re probably thinking, it’s not possible, I really am too busy, but let me remind you that during the US election, where Obama was looking to win a very close election to become president for the first time and was traveling the country to find the needed votes, he still found the time to spend 30 minutes training in the gym.
I remember when I heard that, that it really clicked for me that being too busy was just an excuse, it was all about how important things were for me and prioritisation.
So when we tell people we are too busy to follow our dreams, what we really mean is that they are not important enough and I would prefer to waste time watching TV, reading, surfing the internet, etc., etc., whatever it is you do to just fill time.
So, lets back up. Let’s realise, we do have the time, we just need to prioritise.
Don’t believe me, keep a diary of what you do during a week, doesn’t need to be too detailed, just headlines. Then go back and review it and see how many of the things that you did were actually important, and what you will find is that you have more than enough time if you just eliminate half of the things that just steal your time.
Or even better give that list to your partner and ask them to cross off what was just procrastination on your part and you will be really surprised.
We only get one life, so don’t miss out on your dreams because wasting time on things that are just not important, lets find the time and go for it!
Gordon Tredgold
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