The subConscious Value of Time
How do you quantify the value of your time?
Most people place a higher value on the time and energy they invest at work than what they invest in the rest of their life. It makes sense, we tend to look at the ROI (Return On Investment) of our time. The energy you invest at work has a clear ROI as it is balanced out by a paycheck.
Take a look at the other things that you invest time in. They may not come with a tangible, financial ROI, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t benefits and a form of energetic balance. When you invest time with your family there is an ROI of love, affection, affinity, support and connection. When you invest time in your spirituality there is an ROI of deeper connection and understanding of the Universe/God. When you invest time in your body your ROI is a deeper sense of self-worth, endurance, and vitality.
If these time investments all have a return on their investment, why do we tend to place less value on them?
I recently received a harsh reality check about how I invest my time.
At the beginning of 2016, I was really sick. For months. The kind of sick that takes over your world. Having conversations about scary things like organ failure. I spent about 6 months on bed rest, often times sleeping 18+ hours a day. (I’m much better now and if you want to know more about my health journey, just ask.)
Here’s what I learned from that experience:
I had been undervaluing the benefits of investing time in my body. I had been taking my body for granted.
I exercised, ate healthily and got the average 7ish hours of sleep regularly. But I wasn’t listening to my body. It had been trying to tell me things for months, years even, and I was ignoring it, taking for granted that it would just keep up with me.
I was prioritizing other time investments.
I’d been craving more sleep for about a year, but I had a business coach who kept telling me that I could condition myself to need less sleep and that I need to put in my dues. I’d had a small voice in the still small moments of my meditation telling me to stop consuming alcohol, all alcohol, but I love craft beer and a lot of my social time centered around trying new breweries.
My Mind kept ignoring my Body and Soul’s gentle nudges, so eventually, my Body went on strike. My liver functionality was dangerously low, one of my kidneys was also in trouble, my immune system was on overload. Healing required that I stop drinking (hmm) and I needed lots and lots of sleep (huh).
Any entrepreneur will tell you, it is damn near impossible to keep momentum in the first few years of your business in just a few hours a day. Some days it was painful to invest so much time in sleep, I felt like I was neglecting my business. But it was far more painful to consider the alternative. I am not ready to leave this world, it’s not my time, I have far more to give. I had to shift my perspective and relate to my time resting as productive — it was producing invisible results inside the system of my Body. My Body is necessary for me to continue to run my business so…it gets priority. I had to adjust how I measured the Return on Investing time in something other than work.
Even now that I’m much, much healthier I have a constant conversation with myself about the value of time. Reprogramming my Mind to consider all of the results produced when I invest time in different activities — and not just that quantified with dollars or tangible things.
In a culture that places a high value on money, reprogramming can require some patience and intentionality.
This conversation we have with ourselves about time as a resource — it’s subtle, almost in our subconscious. I assert that to truly have a life that you love, you have to be willing to inquire into this conversation, break it apart, and make some intentional choices about how you will relate to time, how you invest it and the value you place on the results that investment produces.
So, take a look at your own world. What are the benefits you get from investing time in the areas of your life that don’t come with a paycheck attached?
