What’s the most valuable asset you own? Is it your house, your car, or perhaps the value of your pension scheme?If you are like most people, your list includes things such as family, finances, health, friends…
Now, how would you rank these things on your list? This question can be answered in innumerable ways. Frankly, choosing one answer/asset is difficult.
It might surprise you to discover that many highly successful people all rank the same thing at number one: time!
Why time? Because you can never lose time and get it back again. You can’t spend time and go earn more of it. You can’t buy it, rent it, or borrow it. Use it wisely and enjoy the benefits.
Regardless of our backgrounds and talents, all of us have the same number of hours and minutes in a day. Hence, time is the lowest common denominator.
Think about how much attention we give to our finances and money. Working hard to make money, tracking that money in your bank account, researching the best ways to invest said money,reading about ways to make more money, worrying that somebody might steal your money….
What about health, money, friend? Well, you can be healthy, and then get sick, and then regain your health. You can lose your money, and then you can make it all back. Friends too, are important, and yet, how many friends did you have back in the schools or university that you no longer keep in touch with? True, friends are prized, yet we lose them and make new ones all the time.
And yet we typically think little about our time.We routinely let people steal it away from us, even though it’s our most valuable possession.
So how do we break free? Consider these -I call them “time-distractors” and how you can ‘protect’ yourself from this malicious virus:
In my opinion, meetings are notorious for killing time. Believe me I know from my own experience how much time I wasted on countless and useless meetings in my career. Meetings that start either early or too late, and are poorly run, hence, often end without any material accomplishment.
Secondly, too many emails definitely impact our productivity. Research shows that breaking our concentration to respond to an email takes away more time than you might think. Further, since we’re constantly connected, we may be tempted to check email every free moment we get—instead of using those free moments to do something more productive. The most successful people know that the temptation to check and respond to messages is strong. So, they shut off their notifications and only check messages at specific times during the day.
Thirdly, being always at disposal to others – You want to be known as an open and helpful boss, colleagues,collaborator, etc.?. But you only have 24H in each day. How can you help others while ensuring that you achieve your priorities?
Instead of having an open door policy, have designated times for communication when your colleagues are free to ask questions and discuss issues. Doing so will keep them from becoming dependent on you and allows you to use your time more wisely. Time-thieves are inevitable everywhere. The key is to identify which of those are the biggest thieves and then develop your own strategy to fight them accordingly.
I would also like to raise the issue of human capital as your precious asset you own , unless you are approaching retirement, or to be more precise, the cumulative value of your potential future income from working.
Wealth is created by gradually converting your human capital into financial capital whether that’s in the form of investments,property, pensions or physical capital. Nurturing and protecting your human capital should, therefore, be one of your key priorities. You can nurture it by improving your skills, knowledge and experience to maximise your earnings and protect it by looking after your mental and physical health to ensure you are able to work.
“Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is to not stop questioning.” – Albert Einstein. In other words, let’s keep questioning and growing.
We all have the same 24 hours everyday. Winners spend them deliberately. Losers waste them away. If you want to win more often, you need to understand time is your most valuable asset.
We should not waste our time in explaining people whatever we think we should do it because people anyway hear only what thy want to and very frequently in a totally generalized and distorted way. Hence, defending yourself is often a total waste of time. People’s perceptions are clouded by their upbringing and life history. If you’re constantly explaining your decisions, you will only frustrate yourself in the end. Let your actions speak for themselves. And if people don’t interpret them correctly, that’s their problem (not yours). Do you, always!
It may sound as a paradox but sometimes is OK wasting our time. I mean if you genuinely enjoy an activity, then it’s a ‘legitimate’ use of your hours. Ignore people who judge you for doing what you want. They are merely jealous of your joy and trying to take it away.
What about me and my the most valuable asset?
I will tell you what’s biggest asset for me ? It is definitely my ability to know or understand myself! I know, to quite a large extent, the why’s and how’s and whatnots of how my mind works. I know exactly why I behaved in a certain manner during any kind of situation and hence am capable of controlling my behavior in the most difficult or emotional times as well!
On the other hand, most people are extremely acute when it comes to judging other people. But are quite blind to their own faults and shortcomings. This is what causes most conflict between people, mental or otherwise. Their overestimation of themselves in comparison to their underestimation of others.
I wish if you have begin your journey too in searching for yourself! It’s highly essential to be aware of who and what you are, stripped of your bias and definitely without being too extreme. Basically, it’s having the ability to gauge each situation as well as and your reaction to that situation, on it’s own terms without the addition of unnecessary emotions, such as anger, ego and jealousy, that usually cloud your judgment.
Another advantage of this is that I’m able to extrapolate this awareness to trying to understand other people’s point of view without being judging to the maximum of my abilities.
What about you?
