When do you find time to write? You want your blog or, in essence, you business, to be successful and writing is time intensive no doubt. I hear ya, I have my public relations business to run, I have four kids, I still write newspaper articles and I have a household to run, so time is a premium, especially if I want to do the fun stuff, like running, hanging at the beach or playing my guitar.
But in every day there are minutes that are wasted. I don’t remember where I heard it or what the statistic is but to paraphrase, much of our lives are spent standing in line. I know this to be true because I spend every Friday in line at the bank for a minimum of 20 minutes. But it’s not just standing in line. It’s also waiting.
Like today, I waited more than four hours in the jury selection process before I was dismissed. Talk about a waste of time. Add up today’s sit and wait session with Friday’s bank run and we’re at close to five hours of wasted time. Now if I get sick this week and have to see my doctor then I can tack on another 45 minutes to an hour (on a non-busy day). I don’t let those precious minutes get wasted however.
I know I’m busy so I take advantage of the downtime. I also carry a pen and paper with me. EVERYWHERE. Sometimes, if I can’t carry a whole pad of paper I will carry a scratch paper folded up and stick a pen in my hair to use. Then when I get a minute I write. I write down thoughts, observations, witty phrases I can use in a blog post, ideas for future blogs posts, you get the picture.
Some of my best posts have been created while I was waiting to see a doctor. Then when I get home I simply have to type up what I scribbled down. Then I get to use the majority of “my” minutes doing the things I love to do like spending time with the family. Well, maybe not the majority of the minutes. I still end up having to do a lot of work from home, but at least I’m taking advantage of every minute that would’ve otherwise been wasted.
Where are you wasting your minutes?