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I’m not a paragon of efficiency — I “waste” my share of time on social media, Netflix, and absentmindedly staring out of the window when it’s raining.  At some level I have placed some level of value on those things, however that value is difficult to quantify.

As our lives have become more full (I hate the word “busy”), with professional and personal obligations and desires, we have looked to save time in various places and ways — no different than anyone else.

We have outsourced tasks we don’t want to do, and others we do not have time to do, to spend time on things we consider more valuable.  We’ve spent big money on big things — daycare/preschool for the little kids that let us work, and medium things such as a cleaning service that let us maintain sanity.

I do some minor repairs around the house on my own, but my last major DIY project ended up with a broken toilet and flooding the bathroom below. Ever since I’ve been a bit gunshy about certain home improvement tasks.

These “big” things are the ones that physically and/or mentally wear us down or which interfere with our ability to put our time where we want it to be.  Anyone having major difficulties with time management or the constant rush of feeling “busy” all the time needs to tackle these.

There are plenty of these “big” time sucks that are manageable with enough experimentation. I’ve found plenty of them and continue to hack away.

The past three years — since moving to suburbia — I’ve tried to arrange my work schedule to concentrate meetings on certain days so I don’t have to commute as often.  I am an ER physician, but I spend significant work time on non-clinical activities (research, education, some administration). The less time I have to spend on those things in my office, the more time I can spend actually doing those things, while avoiding commutes, traffic, and the other associated wasted time.

I “wrote” most of this blog post using Google voice dictation into Google docs — it lets me get my thoughts out quickly then I can edit later. Far more efficient than typing to get my thoughts on then having to spend significant time refining it later.

My wife and I don’t have these all figured out, but bit by bit we chip away at the big things and make them more manageable.  She’s become great at meal planning without spending hours poring over recipes or grocery shopping, also making it easy for me to make meals for me + kids when she is gone.  I set up universal remotes to control all the electronics in the living room and basement; even our 5-year old can turn on Netflix without help. It basically equals out.

The Little Things

As you conquer the big things that suck up time and don’t add value to your life or others, or perhaps while you conquer the big things, don’t forget the little ones.  There are opportunities to reclaim lost time on routine, mundane, small activities that we do every day.

This came to mind recently as I made our bed (cue eye roll from my wife).  She enjoys coming home and into a tidy bedroom with the bed made. While I enjoy those things as well, I had concluded long ago that it was not a good use of my time. Or if I was going to make the bed, it would basically involve putting the comforter over the pillows and nothing else. 

Not only will it be unmade very soon, with no one around most days to appreciate it’s “madeness,” it interferes with my sleep.  Both due to my work schedule and personality I often come to bed after my wife. Thus if I don’t remember to pull the sheets down before she goes to bed, I’m fumbling in the dark to get under the sheets, making noise, and worried about waking her up. 

Additionally, due to whatever odd sleep habits I developed long ago, I can’t fall asleep unless my feet are uncovered, which means either pulling the blanket/sheet up or sticking them out the side, which significantly messes up my side of the bed.

And of course, don’t get me started on the concept of having seven decorative pillows that have to be stored somewhere every night then carefully replaced every time the bed is made.  Thankfully, we dispensed with those early in our marriage.

Fifty Years of Bed Making

I was thinking about these things one day as I made the bed after she had left for work.  If it takes on average one minute to decently make the bed, that is 30 minutes per month. That is 365 minutes per year, or just over 6 hours per year making the bed.

Extrapolated out over the course of an adult life, let’s say 50 years, that is 300 hours. That is 12.5 days. Add in some decorative pillows, and you easily have a full two weeks of your life spent making the bed.

I hear a lot of people say when deciding what is worth your time — will you look back on your deathbed and wish you had spent more time at work?  While the answer is supposed to be “no,”, I do think there are some people who would say yes. Presumably those people really enjoy their work.

Would you say you wish you had spent more time making the bed?  

Beds and Ice Cream

As mentioned — I reflected on these things while I was making the bed. A few months ago I started periodically just making my side of the bed. I was making such a mess of it that it agitated her, so I started putting my side back together quickly while leaving her side alone.  My primary motivation was not so much to please her as to stop agitating her.

She eventually commented she thought it was odd I wasn’t making the entire bed.  I realized she was right — I was missing the point. The only point of making the bed really would be to bring her a small bit of contentment — so I changed my philosophy.

My underlying views on making the bed have not changed — I don’t want to spend 2 weeks of my life making the bed — but I do want to spend 30-60 seconds doing something easy that my wife appreciates. Also, some people think making the bed is a good thing.

So I told her I’m treating it like ice cream — I’m going to make the bed occasionally, knowing that it brings her satisfaction, but I can’t do it every day, because that would be too much and unhealthy use of my time long-term. 

Is there a perverse logic in this?  Probably. Ultimately this is a lesson about both time management, compromise, and appreciation.  I won’t spend 2 weeks of my life making the bed, but if I spend one day and that supports marital bliss it’s worth it. 

There are other places to make that time back — I’ve learned from my wife and frequently set out my work clothes the night before so when I’m besieged by 3 kids in the morning I don’t have to think about it.  Setting out their clothes the night before helps the same cause.

When making peanut butter toast — the most common breakfast dish in our house — I put the bread in the toaster and while it’s doing its thing I grab the plate, peanut butter, utensils, etc rather than doing those things first then standing and staring at the toaster.  It’s minutiae to the point of sounding obsessive, but this particular task is something I do almost every day. There’s no added value in staring at a toaster while it makes toast, so why not use that time more effectively? I don’t do that for every task — I’m too busy staring out the window to manage all my tasks like this — but I try to do it for the things I do every day.

All this has freed up an enormous amount of time that I can now spend on Twitter, because if there’s one thing I will say on my deathbed, it’s that I wish I spent more time arguing with people on the Internet.

Do you have small time sucks that add up? So, what are your examples and what are the easy fixes?