Everyone has the same 24 hours in a day. What you do with it is up to you, but you may be wasting time each day which can hold you back from reaching your goals.
If you are able to figure out where in your day you are wasting time, you may be able to:
Start a side hustle
Make more money
Pay off debt
Spend more time with your loved ones
Learn a new skill
Have more fun in life
Reach a dream of yours, and more!
Just think about it: What do you think you could do with an extra 5-10 hours, or even more, each week?
You might even be wasting time without knowing it. You might not realize how this wasted time easily adds up to a huge number of hours.
Hopefully today’s topic will help you find hours in your week, no matter how they are lost.
Here are 11 ways you’re wasting time and how to change that.
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1. Checking your email over and over
I’m guilty of checking my email numerous times throughout the day. It’s a problem I have, but I am slowly getting better with lots of room for improvement.
Checking your email can waste a lot of time. By dedicating your time and focus towards checking your email, you may be losing your train of thought when you should actually be doing something else.
I recommend checking your email just a few times a day, or even (EEEK!!!) once a day.
2. Being unorganized
Being unorganized can waste a significant amount of your time and leads to late fees, stress, lost items, and more.
Here are some surprising statistics I found from Simply Orderly about being unorganized:
The average person spends 12 days per year looking for things they can’t find.
Every day the average office worker spends 1.5 hours looking for things.
In a recent survey, 55% of consumers stated they would save anywhere from 16 to 60 minutes a day if they were organized.
23% of people pay bills late and have to pay late fees because they are unable to find their bills.
3. Watching TV
I love a good TV show, but I can honestly say that I watch too much TV. The average person watches TV for over 35 hours per week!
Can you imagine what you could do by reclaiming just half of those hours each week?
4. Gossipping
Whether you spend too much time reading celebrity tabloids or if you talk about people a lot, spreading gossip can be a huge waste of time.
Just think about the amazing things you could do if you focused on yourself instead of wasting so much time gossiping about others.
5. Taking forever to get ready
Many people spend way too much time getting ready and picking out their outfit. By having less clothing options and/or choosing your outfit the night before, you can save valuable minutes each day.
For more information I recommend checking out Becoming Minimalist’s blog post, 8 Reasons Successful People Are Choosing to Wear the Same Thing Every Day.
6. Not having a to do list
I have a constant to do list.
Without it, I would feel lost, unorganized, and probably even confused about what to do! Yes, I rely heavily on my to do list, but putting a to do list together doesn’t have to be hard. I keep my to do list on my phone, and it’s just a simple list of things I need to do. Others find planners work for well for them.
Your to do list will keep you on track so you don’t forget what needs to be done on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis, which in turns keeps you motivated towards your goals.
7. Procrastinating
Procrastination can waste time as you may find anything else you can possibly do before completing a certain task.
Then, you might do things that waste even more time, such as just standing around, watching TV, cleaning the same area you’ve already cleaned 10 times that day, and more.
It’s much better to understand why you are procrastinating and how to create an action plan to stop this time wasting behavior. By focusing on what you need to do, you will stop wasting time!
8. Spending too much time on social media
The average person spends many, many hours on social media each week. Between Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and many others it can be quite easy to waste your entire day away.
If you find that you are spending too much time on social media and that it is negatively impacting you, you may want to close the accounts you are spending too much time on. You can even create a time block so you cannot access your accounts during certain periods of the day, and so on.
9. Being negative
You are wasting time when you are being negative.
Instead of focusing on negatives like regret and being mean, you can be more productive by using this time for things that actually matter.
10. Multitasking
Some people can multitask successfully, but many people cannot with the large amount of time it takes to refocus on a new task. So, if you are constantly switching back and forth, you will have to spend time refocusing every single time.
It’s best to realize your strengths and weaknesses to know whether or not multitasking actually helps you save time.
11. Hitting the snooze button
Sleeping for those two minutes after your alarm goes off isn’t going to change your life. There are many scientific studies proving that hitting the snooze button does nothing good for you.
I know many people who set their alarms to go off anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour before they actually want to wake up.
I’m not going to lie. I used to do this as well and thought it was the only way I could get up. It definitely did not work, as I always felt extremely groggy and sometimes even more tired!
Instead, you should wake up when your alarm first goes off to use those minutes valuably. You should either start going to sleep earlier, or setting your alarm for when you actually get out of bed.
How are you wasting time? How much time do you waste each day?
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