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Time is Money, an apology and course correction to save(er)
By Spender | August 11, 2008
Clearly I’ve not been very good at participating in this project with Saver. I keep saying I will post, only to disappoint Saver by not doing so. I’m sorry I’ve not held up my end of the stick. I promised to post twice a week nearly a month ago and haven’t even posted once in the last thirty days. I apologize. Please forgive my absence and slacking responsibility.
I’m going to recommit to this Saver and Spender relationship by changing how I approach my spender ways. I thought this blog was all about money and how to save it or spend it. That’s tough to do considering I haven’t been making any money lately. The last thing the last thing I’ve wanted to do is dwell on it through blogging.
What I think about all the time is…TIME. What am I doing today? How long will it take? How long should I spend doing said task? That took a lot of time to do that! etc, etc, etc. I’m constantly evaluating what I should be doing to find a job or how to be productive.
Money is not something I really have to save or spend lately. The last three months have been rather depressing. It’s hard to think about money at the moment and therefore I’ve found it difficult to write about. What I do have in abundance and could write about though is time. I’m a time spender these days. Or, currently I feel like a time waster. In order to be more a productive blogger here, I’m going to write about my experience trying to be more self motivated and efficient with my time.
This is roughly how I perceive I spend an average day in the last four months.
9am - wake up and go straight to the computer to check and respond to email.
9:15 to 11:30am - read blogs and news and general exploration of the Internet
11:30 to 1pm - Lunch, TV watching and more surfing the web
1pm to 6pm - Work on personal blog, looking for jobs, sometimes making photographs (although this hasn’t been happening much lately), learning about HTML, Javascript, Google Maps API, etc.
6pm to 7:30pm - Emailing, Watching TV, Facebooking, Instant Messenging, socializing
7:30 to 9pm - Making dinner
9pm on - Watching TV or Wii with Saver
This is not actually how I’d like to spend my day, but it’s a pattern that I’ve developed that has been hard to change. I’d like to get up earlier, make more images, start a multimedia project, do more self promotion, exercise, watch less TV, be consistent about when we eat dinner and stay on top of laundry and tracking expenses.
I’ve come up with a few ideas on how to make this happen.
First, I’m going to start using an time management tracker. Kind of like a budget for time. I’m currently looking for a good online application. (more on this in my next post)
Second, Saver and I are going to be sit down twice a week and figure out if we’re meeting our goals and if not what we should be doing to do so.
Third, I’m going to be blogging about it regularly. Unlike money, self motivation and use of time is something I think about constantly. This is the first time I’ve truely been self employeed/unemployeed and it’s been a wake up call to using time wisely and finding ways to motivate myself.
I’m hoping this new approach to how I spend my time will affect my personal finance woes positively and challenge me to make and spend money prudently.
Topics: Budgets/Expense tracking, Carnivals and Links, Goals, Money Stories, Net worth update, Relationship, Spender's Posts, Uncategorized | Related Posts: Time Two Tell, Time to get serious, About Us
August 11th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
A great way to track both personal and business time is with an online timesheet service such as TSheets.com.
November 4th, 2008 at 10:57 pm
Not about money, it’s about behavior modification.