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Stop Saying You Do Not Have Time · Fierce Encouragement

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Hey there.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is Fierce Encouragement.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Mark Walker.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: And this shows for people who carry more than they maybe should.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Leaders, builders, parents, anyone else that they help.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: But you perform.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: You hold it together most often.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: And somewhere inside that, you might have been running unempty for quite a while, maybe even quietly without sharing that with anyone.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: So in every episode here in Fierce Encouragement, I give you one real tool, one thing you can put into practice today without the hype, without performance, just a truth and a push from someone who's in your corner.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get into it.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: In today's episode, I wanted to talk about this idea of a time problem.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: We're really good at saying, you know, I don't have time for that and push it away.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes it's valid.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we literally don't have time for some of the novel things that we'd like to do during a day.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: But I want to kind of point out this one idea.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think we have a time problem, because that's more of a reflex and not kind of digging into our truth.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: Scarcity, that scarcity mindset that can take over, especially when we're talking about our career or even our relationships, or even looking at our bank account, that panic can set in first.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we kind of have that interior visceral body reaction to what's going on, that scarcity that's kind of staring us in the face.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: And oftentimes, the use of the word I don't have time is that we will sort it out later.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: This answer feels productive when we might use it in meetings or in relationships.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: It might feel like we're avoiding having to answer in an honest way, but it really isn't productive.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: It actually is putting off our growth, our development, and seeing how we can go forward into what we really, really want.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: So often, I don't have time is just another way of saying, I'm not going to make time for that.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's not important to me.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: And dare I say, when we stay in this kind of I don't have time for that thinking in whatever project or area of our life, we aren't giving ourselves an answer that we decided.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's either a yes or no.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: When we let that open decision linger in our mind, even in the subconscious of our mind, it's almost like we have open thread chat threads or text threads that we haven't answered.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And those things, as they cumulate, really do start to wear on our cognitive ability.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, my hands raised here.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is something I really struggle with.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: Having ADHD tendencies of just overdoing it and overthinking it all the time, a hundred and new ideas, but never executing on one.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: Again, you're not alone.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: It feels like you might be productive having those ideas, but that cognitive load is still kind of in the background and it can make you exhausted.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't have time as a reflex, not the truth.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: The second point I wanted to kind of bring up here is the math that flips this excuse around.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and again, this kind of comes from conversations I've had.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: People, when they say I don't have time, are kind of buying themselves time by saying that.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: But what if this, what if the math kind of turns this around and makes that excuse kind of, I don't know, not even viable?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: What if five minutes right now buys you a high focus hour?
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: Truly.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: What if relaxing and planning and sharpening your saw before you start to cut the tree helps you get through that work faster?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe even a 50-minute check-in once a month reshapes the whole month and how you work.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: That small investment pays dividends as you go through your weeks and month.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: This productivity optimization to do, always doing, doing, doing, ingesting information, this kind of performance of productivity, this performance of busyness is not the business of getting uncomfortable.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Again, the performance of a busyness is not your business where you need to kind of get uncomfortable and face the harsher truths and just take a little deliberate action or deliberate practice.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: What if that small investment shifts the way you work or live or operate in your life to come?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe we can start saying that to ourselves.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: I know I can.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: When I find myself saying I don't have time, it's a good place to push back from the desk and ask if I'm just being busy or if I'm actually doing quality business.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: This is a third point that I come back to often in my coaching, often with myself, and just looking at the ancient practices that I've had so much fortune to practice over the past decade plus, and even some of the modern science supporting this.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's simple and it's this.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: And it kind of is a tonic for all the ills that we have.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: Our breath is a doorway.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And what do I mean by that?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Our breath is a doorway.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds nice, Mark.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: But really, ancient wisdom, modern science, they're landing in the same place now.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Look it up.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: One of my favorite books by Herbert Benson, The Relaxation Revolution.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: I believe it's from the late 1970s.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: And there's some studies and just some practices in there that the doctor observed and saw how it transformed some patients' lives and transformed people's mindset.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: You can also look up John Kabat-Zinn and his work with mindfulness stress reduction practice.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: But the breath really is a doorway.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we can kind of avoid it, or we get in that rote activity of the day.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: And again, just from my own personal experience and checking in with my clients, we do.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: We forget about it.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: I know it's easy for me to sit down in the morning, have my coffee, and get to work, and then all of a sudden I blow through lunch because I love what I do, and time is scarce in that sense.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't take time to slow down and breathe, even for one or two minutes.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: But make this a priority for you if you're open to it.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Think of your breath as the doorway.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Most people are barely aware of their own breath and the quality of it, and kind of observing that instrument of the breath, how it shapes their thinking and their energy in the body.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, how could you bring that into practice today?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: How could you observe your breath?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: How could you come back to any training or any commitments you've made the past week or the past year?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: How could the breath help you balance more and tune that instrument?
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to keep this one short today, and I'm just going to go right into the practice I just wanted to share with you as we kind of finish up this short, punchy episode.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Try this this week or this day.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Try one deep conscious breath and pause before your first meeting today.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Really, maybe before you come on camera, try three slow deep breaths.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure your exhale is a little longer.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: When you breathe out, make sure it's a little longer than your in-breath that actually tunes up the parasympathetic or the relaxation kind of nervous system.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: And really, this is the whole practice.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: Where can you insert one conscious breath or three slow breaths right before you go into something that's hectic?
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: Again, that's the whole practice.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Try this for seven days.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'd be really curious as to what it brings up for you.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I want to thank you so much for listening to Fierce Encouragement.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: I really am glad you're here.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope you're putting some of these things into play or taking some wisdom from them.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: I try to keep this short and powerful.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I really appreciate you taking the time to listen and be here.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I just really encourage you to practice and put these things into play.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Where you're at, I hope you have a great day, a great evening, and we'll catch you next time on Fierce Encouragement.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, take care of yourself.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: Bye now.