Lead Your Time... Lead Your Life
Posted on July 11, 2012 by Samia Hassan, One of Thousands of Leadership Coaches on Noomii.
It's time to take control of your life, after setting up your goals you need to decide whether to manage your time or to lead it!
What have you been doing today? Did you finish everything you wanted to finish? Do you still have time to do something else? Are you happy with what you have done or what you are doing?Have you ever felt as though you were busy… but not productive? Not going where you want to go? Or not going anywhere at all?
We are constantly wondering how to fit everything into our time, how to avoid leaving things undone, how to organise our time. One thing I have come to realise recently is that people who worry about how to organise their time tend to be people with ambitions, goals, dreams they endeavour to or want to achieve. Many people face difficulty in having a dream at all, but the moment you learn how to dream, you are filled with overwhelming inspiration causing you to dream more. You end up juggling several dreams in different aspects of your life; it becomes ever so easy to become demotivated! Now, if somebody doesn’t know how to juggle, should they leave all the balls and focus on perfecting the throwing and catching of one ball, or should they learn to juggle? This is when the question of how to organise our time needs to be answered.
Lead Your Time
When we come to organising our time, the skill we need to learn is commonly referred to as “Time Management”. However, as we begin to dream and develop into dreamers, it would be even better to talk about “Time Leadership”.
So, what’s the difference? Management and leadership require different qualities. Managers carry out a plan or a vision which they most likely had no input in. They don’t own what they do, and they don’t have any real contribution to developing the vision. A plan consists of tasks. Whilst the managers may well organise the tasks and be in charge of how to reach the long term goal, the goal isn’t really theirs as it was set by somebody else.
So how are leaders any different? The leader places the vision, the mission, the direction which the manager then implements and works towards. If you name it “Time Management”, you would be organising tasks set for you by somebody else, or you may even be risking serving somebody else’s vision. When you’re a leader, you are in complete control. Not only do you decide how to manage your schedule, but you also get to carefully select every single task on the schedule in order to meet your goals.
Now the hard question: HOW do we lead our time?
To start with, you would need to be very clear about where you are leading your time, and how you are willing to get there. In other words, you need to know your long term goal and your values as well as knowing your mission.
This is where a life coach comes handy. If you are yet to be fully aware of your long term goals, your values and your mission, a life coach will help you to realise what these are for you. A life coach will help you achieve your long term goals, bearing in mind your values and your mission. A life coach will help you lead your time towards accomplishing your mission. With a life coach, you can get to know your values and ensure your goals are aligned with your values. You can define your mission and set your specific goals. Only when these things are clear can you take full control of your time and in turn, full control of your life. Rather than working towards reaching other people’s goals, you will be the leader of your life. Sounds like a happy life, right?
“The key is in scheduling your priorities, not prioritizing your schedule”
