It's About Time

Actually, it's about making time.

I don't know anyone this day and age who does not wish they had more time in their day/week/month/year/lifetime. Don't you?

I have major limits on my time these days. Don't get me wrong. I am responsible for the time constraints I face each day.

We all have work and responsibilities. Some of us have children (well, not me personally) or pets or family members or friends or other types of obligations that limit the amount of time we have to do more of the things that we want.

I am a HUGE procrastinator. That takes up whatever free time I have leftover from my busy schedule. I often think that if I could just get myself moving, I would accomplish a ton each day.

Back in the day, when I used to actually go out on a regular basis, I would spend hours getting ready. But very little of that time was actually used to accomplish anything. I could get myself ready in very little time. The thing that held me up was getting started to get ready.

It's my mantra today-it doesn't take me a long time to get ready, it takes me a long time to get started. And I married a procrastinator.

If I added up all the time in my life that I have spent procrastinating, I'd have a couple of extra years of free time!

Enter Farbsday.

A long time ago, my dear friend and I were talking and we decided that all we needed in life was an extra day. She said, laughingly, "We'll call it Farbsday!" I don't know why, but, Farbsday stuck with me and I have longed for it ever since.

Every once in awhile, I post it on Facebook that I am starting a movement to add this day to our week. We should be able to whittle a couple of hours here and there. And there would be absolute laws for Farbsday that would never be able to be amended or tampered with. It will be a day for catching up. No one will be allowed to do anything that is disagreeable to them. No one will be allowed to schedule showers or birthday parties or weddings or funerals or holy days of obligation or big projects on Farbsday. It will be for catching up on reading or seeing friends or making a nice dinner for our families instead of a thrown together meal at the last minute.

It will be about savoring every exquisite second we have doing only things we love or seeing only people we love.

Sounds perfect doesn't it?

I am one of those people that, when someone says "let's get together!" I think to myself "Yeah, right. Like I have time for that!" But I usually say yes knowing that we'll never end up making plans anyway.

I remember watching a segment on a morning show about Oprah. It was kind of like a day in the life of the busiest woman in America. I learned a few things. One is that Oprah does not set an alarm clock. She relies (or did then) on her own internal clock to get her up on time and she never snoozed. She just woke up at some ridiculous hour like 4 in the morning and just got out of bed and started her day.

No alarm clock? No snoozing? Unfathomable. But I realized that Oprah is an exceptionally organized woman. I'm sure it helps that she has people to keep her on track-assistants and publicists and the like. But, the idea and the simplicity of just waking and beginning your day is absolutely brilliant.

My issues with time are mostly of my own making. My feeble excuses for finding time are starting to wear thin on my own nerves. I am feeling a call to action.

This past week, I heard from an old friend. He's been saying we should get together and I have been giving him my stock answer of OK but never pinning anything down. This time I said OK and gave a day and time and we met last night for drinks at our old haunt. It was a lovely evening of catching up and reminiscing and I enjoyed every precious second!

My procrastinating style is of the all-or-nothing variety. I feel like I don't want to start cleaning out my closet if I can't complete the project all at once so I don't ever clean out that closet. Then, when I finally get enough free time to do it, I waste so much time stalling and negotiating with myself that, before I know it, I am out of time. My stall tactic is usually telling myself how busy I've been and how I deserve a little me time and I should relish it. Yadda Yadda Yadda!

This week, I turned a corner in that I decided to make use of even the smallest amounts of time. It's a work in progress but I have accomplished some minor things like drinks with a friend and getting right in the shower this morning instead of watching Matt Lauer.

And I made time for blogging.

It's my new leaf. I turned it over and I am going to make a conscious effort to meet up with people when I'm invited and stop using my lack of time as an excuse for not accomplishing anything.

These little snippets of time add up to a lot of wasted time so I am vowing here and now to use them to their best advantage. But first I have to watch Harry Potter. Is it Farbsday yet??