Hell Yes or No
How to get more time.
This is the best productivity hack or tip you’ll find. Nothing saves time, quite like this. Mark Manson author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck classifies his decisions in two categories. When presented with a project, an invitation to an event, a meeting or anything else, it all comes down to hell yes or no. The yes has to be powerful and convincing, otherwise it’s a no.
For Mark, the idea of giving his time to something is a big deal. As the author of The Subtle Art… the thesis of the buck is to not live carelessly. In fact, it’s a guide book on what to give a f*ck about. The purpose is using your time the way you want. On your terms. With you in control. Too often, we give our time to meaningless, pointless and mundane things. Then we wonder where our time goes. We complain that we have no time. No, the time is there. You simply just used it on the wrong thing. You spent time. Instead of investing time. By saying Hell Yes what you agree to means that you love the idea. It may be something you are excited about. You find the time given to the event, invitation or project worth your time. All of this brings it back full circle to Mark Manson’s book and why for him, it’s a Hell Yes or No.
Similar to your money, you can decide to spend it or invest it. Spending money or time is often a waste. When investing time or money the result is something you can grow and enjoy for much longer than when you spend time. Investing time in your marriage allows it to grow. Investing time with your friends, studying, gardening or learning a recipe allows you to grow in that field. When you invest, you are determined for an outcome. Spending time is just not the same.
The only resource we have that we cannot buy is time. We cannot make more of it. The time that has passed we cannot get back. The time you spent reading this blog is also gone forever (thank you for reading this blog). I’ve written about it before, the power of saying no more often. By saying no more often you can say hell yes to what matters to you. And you can do what you say hell yes to better. You can try all the hacks, tricks and tips you want. However, try this approach. Everything that comes your way is either hell yes or no. No need to think about it. No need to make someone else happy by saying yes. Does it make you happy? Does it fulfill you? Or, is it a time suck? A waste of time. Stop complaining about time when you willfully give it away.
Seneca, Stoic Philosopher, Politician and Play-Write has this saying;
“It is not that we have a short space of time, but that we waste much of it. Life is long enough, and it has been given in sufficiently generous measure to allow the accomplishment of the very greatest things if the whole of it is well invested. But when it is squandered in luxury and carelessness, when it is devoted to no good end, forced at last by the ultimate necessity we perceive that it has passed away before we were aware that it was passing.So it is—the life we receive is not short, but we make it so, nor do we have any lack of it, but are wasteful of it.”
Lastly, I conclude with another Seneca line;
“People are frugal in guarding their personal property; but as soon as it comes to squandering time they are most wasteful of the one thing in which it is right to be stingy.”
Thought Provoking Question 1 : What are you wasting time on? Can you limit the things you say yes to?
This week practice this. It’s either a Hell Yes or a No.
Dan Roman is a Husband, Father, and writer that releases a daily blog. A quick read on sharing wisdom and asking though-provoking questions.
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