How I Spent My Time in December

There are two important and measurable currencies that I track on a daily basis — time and money. It’s important for me to be accountable for the proper stewardship of the gifts of time and money I have, so I like to track how I use it. For a more detailed article on tracking time, check out this article.

Each month, I view the time I used not in terms of hours or minutes, but in terms of proportion. Of course this is possible only if you actually have the minutes and hours data to analyse. Here’s a pie chart of how I spent my time in December:

As is usually the case, December was a slow month at work. Most people are away for the holidays or preparing for Christmas, so there aren’t as many clients to meet. This is reflected by the 27% of waking hours spent at work. This December was also a time spent renovating my new place and moving in, so I spent a lot of my waking hours (31%) with my wife. Personal time took up about 35% of the time.

By looking at the percentage of time I spend in this three main areas of my life, I can tell whether or not I’ve had a balanced life the past month, and resolve to make changes for the next.

We often hear people talk about having a work-life balance, but few actually take the time — probably because they don’t have the time — to actually figure out how to measure that work-life balance.