You remember that movie “In Time” with Justin Timberlake running around the block? It wasn’t a great movie at all, but there was one good line:

Time is now the currency. - Will Salas (played by Justin)

He is wrong. It has been always the one and single currency. We as humans have invented the concept of time and gave it a subjective measurement. From then on we use time as currency even if we are not aware of it. Think about it. For every day of life we “pay” 24h of our time. And funny enough, the wealth of time comes to us by the default on day 1, when we are born. Unlike the monetary wealth which most of us spend most of our time chasing.

Naturally, our wealth is reduced every day, every hour, every minute. Can we stop the process? No. Which brings me to the next point.

What Do We Do With Our “Wealth”

We all do only one thing with time - invest. We don’t “spend” time per se, we invest. Taking a step back, we should then ask another question: What is a good investment? Any investment is good that brings you the ROI. ROI is the bottom line, it is all that matters. But by investing right you can accumulate more money - you can’t accumulate more “time”, right?

You can only “save your time in your future”, by not wasting it today.

“Saving the time” could be many things at the same time, so let’s start with a couple of examples:

You can invest time into learning a new skill. That skill can allow you to fulfill a particular job. You can get that job and you can get paid for doing it. So you turn your time investment into money. Mind you, ROI is not the money here. By getting your paycheck - you just getting a tool to get your [time] ROI.

Presume, before getting this new job, you had to clean your flat/house yourself. Now you can afford to pay for a cleaner - you save 2 hours per week now. You can now perhaps spend some more on food and order it online - that saves you 1-2 hours per week on shopping. Let’s say you get to save 3 hours per week now. Simple math - that’s 156 hours or 6.5 full days of time saved per year. All now at your disposal. This is your ultimate ROI. How you are going to invest this time - is up to you now.

By the way “How do I invest my time?” - is a wrong question to ask. Because let’s be frank - you know the answer. You know that you should finish that online course, learn how to submit a tax return if you are self-employed (that’s on my list hehe), read finally that book that you still didn’t cross off your list since 2 years ago, go to the gym because your “love handles” are growing into “love wings” that flap around your body. You know that. You do.

A much better question to ask yourself is “What do I waste my time on and why?”. Because if you don’t know the answer to that…bad news - you could be in a perpetual self-degrading state called zombie-like existence. Let’s get out of there, find the time-suckers and eliminate them.

First…

What Can You Do To Save More of Your Time

Good question. If you were expecting some time-management advice here - you can stop reading now. Time-management is a shallow concept I don’t buy it and I don’t think you do either. If I ask you right now how many of the “great time-management techniques” that you have read about you actually use? So do I - zero.

To save your time you just need two things, two lists actually:

1. Priority list.
2. Ignore list.

Priority List

Sounds self-explanatory, but this is an important detail. A story about Warren Buffet’s private airplane pilot will illustrate it.

One day Warren asked his pilot, let’s call him Luke: “List your 25 goals for your life on a paper”. Luke did that. Then Warren asked him to choose 5 top-priority goals very carefully and circle these. After some careful consideration, Luke turned back with his top 5. “So why do you think I have asked you to choose the top 5, Luke?”

Luke went on to tell that top 5 would be ultimate goals that he should be going towards and the rest are secondary goals that he should accomplish along the way if he has a chance. “You got it wrong”, said Warren. “All goals that were not in your top 5 just became your ‘avoid at all cost’ stuff that you should not focus at all. Instead, direct all your attention to the 5 you got at the top until you reach them. Then, you can consider the rest”.

To sum up here are the 3 steps:

1. Write down all your goals that you can think of.
2. Choose the top 5 (yes, 5, not more Warren says, I trust that guy) that have the highest priority status.
3. Split the list into two: top 5 go to the Priority List, the rest  - Avoid At All Cost List.

Ok, you got your priorities down. Next.

Ignore List

You might ask, didn’t we just create the list to ignore by following Buffet’s method…? We did, yes. Avoid At All Cost List - is strategic, macro level list that makes you avoid things in the long run. Ignore List is tactical, it’s for your day-to-day operation.

A few years ago I had a conversation with one of the teachers in my institute and he shared this idea with me. Ignore List contains every item that you should not pay attention to while you do your work, tinkering your own project, writing a blog post, etc. Ignore List is your reminder to keep the distractions off the table. Things such as:

• Facebook
• All messengers
• Youtube
• News sites
• TV

All make great candidates for the list. They all are in mine. My life is much easier with such list and I don’t get frustrated at the end of the day: “Oh I didn’t complete anything today” You can’t ignore these things? Fine - put your phone on silent, airplane, do not disturb, turn it off and put in the drawer in your bedroom. Same with your iPad. You will get used to silence over time and trust me, you will start enjoying it. You will feel that your time investment is more valuable now, besides you get more shit done.

You can make the Priority List once and revisit it to amend if needed, but your Ignore List should become your new partner in whatever you are doing. Have you own version of Ignore List for your job, for when you are hanging out with friends (does anyone like that guy who is always on the phone, while you all sit at the table and talking?), on a date, or anywhere else..

In every activity you can find a distraction, equally, you can ignore it.

Don’t underestimate the power of these two lists. If followed, they can help you achieve two things: keep you focused on the things that matter and keep you clear of those that don’t matter. Read your lists often and you will see how they naturally become part of how you do things.

I will leave you with my version of the quote on time and currency that we have started with:

Author: Time is the ultimate currency. And the truth is that you have a full control of the exchange rates.