Eliminate Time Traps 1

Eliminate Time Traps Part 1n
By the way, weren’t labor saving devices supposed to give us more free time? Time to spend with loved one, etc…Well research shows that the average American is working 160 more hours per year more than we did in 1960. That’s one full additional month of 40-hour workweeks.
Our time and attention are more vulnerable to theft than ever before. You have to eliminate the energy suckers in your life--those are people or projects that leave you feeling depleted.
We need to weed out the energy suckers in our lives, but we often hang onto them out of guilt or just plain habit. So many of us have had our electronic devices surgically implanted onto our bodies so we’re always available, always plugged in.
It’s great to be able to use our BlackBerry, cell phones and laptops anywhere while we wait. I do it myself, but if we’re not vigilant it can easily become an addiction. Soon we’re going to have call Technology Anonymous.

Let me ask you, what does technology take the place of? What did we do in airports before we had BlackBerrys, cell phones and laptops? Veg out? Read? Sleep? Talk on the pay phone? Daydream? Contemplate new ideas? We’d all agree that it’s now wonderful to turn this wasted time into productive time. Right?

But be careful. It’s great as long as you remain in charge rather than letting the technology take charge of you. Our current ability to bring the office and all our contacts with us wherever we go transforms wherever we go into a place where we always are. The physical surrounding matter less. We live by responding the messages, processing more and more data, but when do we stop and think? When do we linger over a thought? When do we make love or connect with our kids?