Procrastinate on Purpose: 5 Permissions to Multiply Your Time

I have to admit that this book came in a while back and after reading the title I double-checked to see if it was addressed to me or the magazine. I’ve put off looking at it for a while, “purposely” of course, but now that I’ve looked at it I wanted to present it to TLC readers right away. When I first scanned through it, I immediately saw he challenged the idea that time management was all about balance. I’ve always thought that balance might work for someone with lots of time and not a lot to do, so was with him on that. What about when you feel like there is always more to fit in than you can reasonably get to? Perhaps I found someone who was going to find me more time without forcing me to balance.

Vaden offers, among the 5 Permissions or wishes that he grants, the Permission to Ignore. He goes so far as to say balance is crap and the idea of work-life balance is an impractical concept that won’t bring us the results we seek. Avoid it, he says.

But, it’s not that he agrees with the ways I’ve been operating, either. I was also challenged to re-look and rethink things.

In fact, in a personal note to me on page 19, he states: “Telling yourself and others how ‘busy’ you are is a self-defeating pattern that erodes your feeling of ownership and control that thwarts your creativity from being used to find solutions to your challenges.”

I had just heard from a different source about recognizing the value of what we contribute is all of our interactions and feeling good about what we add. When I read what Vaden said about ownership, control and creativity that rang true for me. It showed me the cost of not relooking at how I was operating.
This won’t reflect his more comprehensive approach, but there are a couple of more things I have room to mention.

There’s also a good section on how to shift my sense of priorities. I didn’t think they needed to be. We all know priorities are important, but he asks does it multiply our time? That is the one of the critical questions to ask, he says. “Prioritizing does not create more time.” And that’s what he intends—to show how to multiply our time.

Vaden suggests prioritizing in this direction:
“You multiply your time by spending time on things today that will give you more time tomorrow.” It’s getting ahead of urgent.

Another concept worth taking in was how the ability to delegate involves the giving yourself permission to be imperfect. And no, it’s not really easier—or time-saving—to just do it yourself. I often find myself thinking and doing that, but he calculates it out and shows you how much that concept costs you in time and money. He even gives you a formula to use to know how much time to spend on training someone so you have a clear idea of each situation.

Is it worth it to hire someone to help you around your home. Not if it’s your passion to do it yourself, he says. If not, he shows you how to calculate it.
Vaden covers a lot. It’s helpful for business, and as he puts it: if you run a household, you run a business. It’s also about and useful for Faith, Family, Fitness, Fun, Faculty (work) and Finances in a 168 hours a week—and finding your own sense of balance.

Who knows? Maybe in the future when asked how I am I’ll forget to say that I’m busy. Most of us are. Vaden helps us with concepts and tools that allows us to be more present—and reach our goals. A very useful book.