Leisure is Structured Time

Have you ever contemplated the meaning of time? What is time and how do we measure it? Time is a distraction, a cover-up for our life. We clock-in and think we are trading time for money but we are actually trading our life away. Wasting time is wasting life and the clock is always ticking.

When it comes to time, leisure specifically, it is not overstimulation of the senses, socializing, wasting time, sloth, over-indulgence or immediate gratification. Leisure is the ability to take a structured approach to life and events which others may do quickly or haphazardly. Leisure is brainstorming ideas and then organizing them into a coherent narrative before writing begins. Thus, we do not end up with an article that requires the round filing cabinet or extensive revisions. If one must have chaos inside to give birth to a dancing star, then it follows that one must cohere that chaos into a solid form. Thus, we begin with chaos and guide and direct it into our own light.

Leisure is Structured Time

While it may seem antithetical, structuring your life(time) allows one to make the most of it. We all only get one life and it transpires twenty four hours at a time. A good life is not built by one-off efforts or destiny alone. It takes shape slowly, choice by choice, little by little. Structuring time guides us on our purpose in life, ensuring we accomplish that purpose minute by minute.

Take the Long View

Focus on the long-term and prepare for the future.

Long-term planning allows us to prepare for and guide the direction of our lives. Preparing for the future with structured time means planning for the coming seasons (gardening, school, tax season), special days (like birthdays and family holidays) and mapping the steps toward accomplishing your life goals.

Prepare for the future by taking time today to look at a calendar and note what is coming in the next month. Then zoom out and ask yourself what is coming in this year. Whether it is college or Christmas, advanced planning prevents us from reacting to the most pressing or immediate need and this is an enormous advantage. They could include planting and harvesting dates, holidays, anniversaries, birthdays, school start and end, and vacations. Could your state your one, three and five-year goals? What are the milestones on the journey towards these goals? Think about how these will fit into the warp and weft of your life.

Mountains Move one Pebble at a Time

Structuring your time enables you to make your hopes, dreams and desires a reality. The compounding effects of repeated actions over time are enormous and amount to much greater impacts than a single herculean effort could. It could be tending a garden, learning an instrument, mastering a craft or daily exercise. My partner is fond of saying that repetition is the master skill. He is right. Like investing, the returns compound over time and the daily effort is rewarded handsomely with a beautiful flourish and more effort. This is growth. Rising to meet the road.

Said the raindrop to the mighty mountain: "A little effort, repeated daily goes a long way."

Growth happens over time and each contribution you make towards that growth compounds into the future, like repeating a mantra. A mantra is strengthened and anchored into your being by first listening to it, then learning it, playing with it and finally internalizing it. Setting our own priorities and goals and planning time to work with them, anchors them into the fabric of our life. Similarly to choosing an appropriate mantra, setting your own priorities and taking daily action that supports them ensures you are directing your life towards your desired outcomes.

Much More than a Paycheck

Set your own priorities. Structuring your time balances rest with your required activities and your individual priorities, whether they be hobbies, family, legacy, or accomplishment. The elusive work/life balance many seek today could be easily achieved by structuring their time outside of work. When asked to overcommit to work for the second, (or third or fourth time... ), structured leisure time provides a credible built-in exit . Liberate yourself with the phrase, "I would love to help but I have other commitments."

Structuring your leisure time allows you to set your own priorities and it insulates us against the twin evils of over work and sloth. Figuring out what you want to do with your life can be challenging but figuring out your interests and priorities is a lot easier. You probably already know what these things are so make a rough sketch of your time outside work. If you want to prioritize family, then set aside an hour to help with homework followed by family games. If you want to write a novel, set aside an hour to write before bed. You get the idea, I don't get your excuses. :) Consistent self direction, strategy and understanding the structure of time create the best outcomes.

The Shape of Time

The four time structures we will discuss are cycles, clocking, patterning and tasking. Cycles define the bigger picture, the background landscape of your life. Cyclical events are seasons, holidays, semesters and your own personal cycles; moon times. These events come and go whether you choose to participate in them or not. On top of this we layer clocking, which defines the shape of most people's lives. Clocking sets dates and times for specific activities. One very common example of clocking is business hours. Recurring activities (soccer, piano, dentist appointments, yearly exams etc...) are also examples of clocked time. Clocking allows us to plan activities and coordinate schedues. Patterning could also be called tasking, or routines but it can be much bigger than that. Patterns can span years, weeks or minutes. Showering and dressing for the day is a routine. Taking a hike every Sunday after Church is a pattern. Progressing through schooling, menstrual cycles and the events spanning birth to death also a patterns. Tasking is your to-do list. It helps us track actions to be completed. Tasking is often associated with another method of time structuring. For example, the two tasks of buying jelly beans and dyeing eggs must be completed before the cyclic event of Easter Sunday. Cycles, clocking patterning and tasking all intertwine to define the shape of our life.

Structure your Freetime

I don't like to start small, thus, I ended up learning to play my favorite song on the piano but had the most terrible timing, but, enough about me. Let's start small-ish. Buy a calendar or planner that has a two-page calendar for each month. Pick a Saturday morning to look at the upcoming cycles of life but focus on the next three months. Here is how I do my planning.

As I write, Easter is over, Spring is on the way in and I know I have to plan my summer garden before Mother's Day, summer is coming and the kids will be out of school. So, I have to plan a vacation and create summer reading assignments for the kids, as well as a list of chores. Ask yourself if you need to plan vacation or put your kids to work to keep them busy. There are several birthdays and a few anniversaries adorning the coming three months; a favorite aunt, my own, my mother's, best friend's and then my partner's. None of their ages are round numbers so no special plans required. If you are picking up what I am laying down, write your own equivalents to these items into your calendar.

Next, I look for clocked activities; partner bought concert tickets next Saturday night...ish? Confirm and write it down. Contact a friend and set a date to meet for coffee. Check for doctor and dentist appointments, PTA or school events and note their times. Look for one activity you enjoy, say dancing, and set a date to go check it out. Then add the priorities, like Family Game night, yoga class, novel writing, physical therapy, etc... to the calendar.

Patterned activities are mostly already a linked set of activities but if you want to change the pattern, now is a good time to think about that. If, for example, you wanted to walk more, think about how you could add that in to your life. Perhaps you commit to try walking after dinner every day next week. Write that at the top of your calendar and then write it down every day of the week with a little checkbox next to it. This will help you evaluate your planning and prioritizing next week.

Tasks go along the right-hand side of the calendar -these are things that will be done but aren't aloted to specific times. I usually cross them out once they are complete. There you have it folks, how to structure your time leisurely to move towards your goals, maintain work life balance and to build a life you are happy to live. Commit to structuring your time and it will become second nature.