An Outside the Box Approach to Time Management: Secondary Research #3

When conducting research for a topic obviously the most direct, precise, and accurate information is the most helpful, however on that same token finding information that may be unconventional or “out of the box” to your topic can be just as resourceful and useful. While on medium I came across a blog called “An Outside-the-Box Time Management Technique” that really took this issue of time management and came at it with an unconventional approach that makes you stop and think.

The 2 main points this blog is to manage your energy rather than time and live in the present. For example, as Jeff Finley wrote “Don’t “manage” time, but work on your mindfulness and increasing awareness… Manage energy not time, follow inspiration and curiosity, go with the flow.” (Finley 2015). In other words, he is expressing both in that quote and throughout his post about how time is just an illusion, and the idea of managing time is just as crazy and you should rather manage your energy, maximize your energy so you can complete tasks rather than merely what a clock says. He also talks about how you should manage your ‘time’ to the extent that it helps you enjoy your life (‘time is a social agreement’), as in do what helps you enjoy your life (what I can gauge from that is even if the work is unpleasant like your daily job, that paycheck helps you enjoy life). The overall theme he was trying to portray is not to necessarily manage time but be present and not worry what a clock says (he mocks the reactions to clocks like oversleeping etc.) and maximize your energy to the present and what makes you happy.

What I learned from this blog post is as much as it may go against a lot of the research I have down about time management it also agrees with it, the main point of time management is to maximize yourself to perform the responsibilities and obligations you have in a way that is healthy and efficient, and his ‘out of the box’ approach accomplishes just as well in theory as the other skills and strategies I have found while researching. Going forward, I’m not going to totally disregard what a clock says but I will care just as much as maximizing my energy as maximizing my time (the 2 in my opinion go hand in hand).

Blog post: https://betterhumans.coach.me/an-outside-the-box-time-management-technique-5cba38ec9632