I don’t have time. Words I hear more often than possibly any other. And for some reason it’s really started to bother me. I don’t have time.
We live in an age where all people do is try to save time. Find more efficient ways to do things. Inventions that help us do more, faster. To get places faster. To accomplish things, faster. To cook faster. To clean faster. To wash faster. To become something, faster. And yet, we still claim “I don’t have time”.
I’ve been doing some thinking about how I spend my time and why I spend it the way I do. What matters. What doesn’t matter. What’s taking up most of my time. Is that what I want to take up my time. Am I doing things that make a difference in the long run. Am I busy for the sake of being busy.
At the end of the day, can I say I used my time the best way I could. That my use of time made me better, my family better, the people around me better.
As I’ve gone through this process, the phrase “I don’t have time” has nearly left my vocabulary. Because we DO have time. We have plenty of time to do the things that really matter to us. We have time and to spare. We just have to pick what it is that matters.
Instead of saying “I don’t have time” try making a shift in your words. And anytime you find yourself going to say those words, say “It’s not a priority for me” instead. Be it out loud or in your head. And see what happens. Suddenly the things you thought you didn’t have time for but actually really matter to you start to take priority. And the things filling your time that maybe don’t matter as much as you thought they did, those get replaced with top priority items.
“I don’t have time” changes to “It’s not a priority for me”. We have time for what we want to make time for. This is almost always true (barring obvious things like chronic or short-term illness or really little kids who need our constant attention to stay alive, etc.–you all know what I mean). But even then, there is a season to our time and priorities shift during different seasons.
Yes, some things get left behind and things we’d like to do don’t get done. Sacrifices have to be made. Not because we don’t have enough time but because some things don’t matter as much as we fool ourselves in to thinking they do.
And not all time should be filled with a million activities. Sometimes, we need time to just be. Time to be available. Time to think. Time to talk to God. Time to be still.
But the things that matter the most–those get done. We have time for those.
Try it. This week. Instead of saying I don’t have time, make that mental shift and see if it helps get the things that actually matter to the top of your list. You’ll be surprised at what you actually have time for.
