It’s About Time: The Relationship between Time Management and Our Mental Health, (Part I)
“It’s how we spend our time here and now, that really matters. If you are fed up with the way you have come to interact with time, change it.”
-- Marcia Wieder
In the past month, I have read two excellent books on time management and productivity. The first is Smarter Faster Better, by Charles Duhigg, and the second is The Pomodoro Technique, by Francesco Cirillo. I hadn’t necessarily set out to read up on these topics, but I do believe they caught my attention for a reason. For me, one of the most difficult parts of this pandemic has been figuring out how to manage my time. I went from being overscheduled in my pre-pandemic life, to having little to no structure at all since late May. For better or for worse, I have typically allowed externally imposed deadlines to determine my scheduling along with many of my daily and hourly choices. In retrospect, I see how this has given me the illusion of a lack of control in my life. Surprisingly, my anxiety has increased as a result of having to take full control over my goal setting and scheduling -- and I know I am not alone in this scenario. The tips and techniques outlined in these books are excellent, but one of the biggest takeaways for me was gaining insight into this mental piece. As a result of the wealth of information that I felt was important to cover, I have decided to split this into two separate posts. The first one covering how our mental state affects our time management, and the second focusing on how sharpening our time management skills can improve our mental relationship with our work. Most of the practical application will be covered in Part II.
To understand this mental health aspect more deeply, I think it is important to examine the psychological aspect of time. In his introduction, Francesco Cirillo identifies two separate perceptions of time: the first he calls time ‘becoming’, “an abstract dimensional aspect of time that gives rise to the habit of measuring time” (p. 22). The second is the fairly self-explanatory ‘succession of events.’ Of the two of these, it is our perception of time ‘becoming’ that creates mental dissonance. In application to my own life, it is the sense of time dissolving, or passing, and the persistence of the mind in evaluating how much or what has been accomplished in relation to time. This fixation on what remains unaccomplished, in addition to our perception of time being out of our locus of control, affects our productivity. Sometimes it even prevents us from starting all together -- a kind paralysis by analysis. These two books have helped me understand how three main concepts associated with our minds impact productivity and our relationship with time: They are motivation, focus, and mental rest.
MOTIVATION
One of the biggest mental hurdles to true productivity is lack of motivation. In Smarter Faster Better, author Charles Duhigg links motivation to a sense of personal control in relation to a task or activity. He states: “Motivation becomes easier when we transform a chore into a choice. Doing so gives us a sense of control.” From this perspective, a life thrown out of normalcy by something like a pandemic offers countless opportunities for personal choice. What does one practice when there are no concerts to prepare for? It could be anything -- the choice is fully in the hands of the practicer. But what if that is simply not enough to motivate? The answer, according to Duhigg, is to ask yourself “why does it matter?” If you can link your resistance to completing a task or activity to your deeper values and goals, self-motivation becomes more natural. With practice these self-directed choices can become habit, and with habit, lack of motivation becomes less and less of an issue.
FOCUS
If motivation is no longer a part of our problem, we still live in a world filled with distractions and interruptions, so mental focus almost always presents a challenge to productivity. Cirillo separates types of distractions into two categories: internal and external. The internal disruptions are almost always more of a persistent problem than the external ones he claims. While I strongly suspect that this man has never tried to get substantial work done with kids around, this point was a revelation upon greater self-examination. His method calls for a simple recording method for enumerating the type of disruption; one that acknowledges and records these internal and external disruptions, thereby allowing us to manage them. I was very surprised to see that my mind did in fact create far more interruptions than the outside world, and that only rarely do these interruptions need to be dealt with immediately. I felt more clear headed knowing that my growing to-do list could wait, and was able to gently bring my mind back to the task at hand. I will go into more specifics about his recording method and process in the next article.
To further improve focus, Duhigg recommends building mental models in the form of “telling ourselves stories - about what we expect to see.” He goes on to describe a specific method of visualization, posing and answering questions about order of events, types of possible distractions, how those distractions could be mitigated, and criteria for evaluating and ensuring success. There have long been links between people who use visualization as a tool in their work and lives to higher rates of success and satisfaction. It appears that time management and productivity benefit from this powerful habit as well.
REST AND RECOVERY
The inclusion of rest and recovery into a work day plan is not a new idea. If we don’t understand that we need rest from being told we need it, we will eventually know because our bodies will tell us. As a musician, the importance of taking a break to move our bodies, stretch, and rest has been emphasized in my training from a young age. However, tackling the information in these books has shown me how crucial mental rest is throughout the day. I realized that often my ‘breaks’ during a practice session would include me frantically trying to get other things done: move the laundry over, return that overdue email, make a phone call. . . Or worse, I continue to let my mind obsess over what hasn't been going well in said practice session.
Lately, I have been using the regularly scheduled 5 minute breaks per 30 minutes to literally do nothing. I have experimented with lying on my foam roller, meditating in a seated position, or getting into a corpse pose with my legs elevated at 90 degrees (great for people who spend a lot of time sitting). In yoga it is commonly emphasized that this final ‘savasana’, or corpse pose, is the most important pose of all, and that all of the previous work done in the session is absorbed and ‘learned’ by the body in this time. Our regular work benefits from this absolute silence of the mind and body as well. I also found that only by quieting my mind was I truly able to connect with how physically tense I was, and where that tension was hiding. My physical recovery has greatly improved by including this new habit throughout my day.
In my next post I will do my best to share these methods and techniques, and how I have tailored them for all the different roles in my life. In the meantime, if you are interested in learning more, pick up one of these books! Charles Duhigg’s book reads like a page turner in places, full of engrossing real-world stories and anecdotes. The Pomodoro Technique is short and sweet, and beautiful in it’s simplicity of approach. If anything, reading them has reminded me that we are never too old to make changes in our lives that are meaningful.