If you will allow me, I would like to return to the issue of time management. Recently, I have been thinking about it some more, and I have a couple things to say.

The Importance of Being Earnest

No, I’m not referring to Oscar Wilde here. One of the things I have observed in my struggles with time management skills is that it is incredibly important to be earnest in your desire to grow in this area. Otherwise, it’s like trying to build a sandcastle with too much water in the sand: it just crumbles when you remove the mold.

Does this mean that we have to hold unwavering resolve in order to make any progress? Of course not! Our God is a forgiving God, and is used to working with flawed clay (Heck, He’s been doing it since the Fall). He does not require that we be perfect to improve; that would be absurd, but He does look for a willing heart.

Post-It Notes®

Post-Its are wonderful creations. They stick almost anywhere. They come in all shapes, sizes and colors. And they are actually really useful for time management purposes. Though it may not be abundantly obvious how they help, they really do. It’s something my mom encouraged me to do.

In the morning, you take your various responsibilities and hobbies into account. Pray it over with God. I journal about it, but not everyone benefits so much from writing prayers down. After getting a sense for what God wants you to do, pray about what priority different items on the list take. Then work out an order in which to tackle them.

Here’s an example Post-It for me (with names of people in asterisks):

1. Math
2. Read The Brothers Karamazov Sections 6.1-6.3
3. Write letter to **** and *****
4. Check in on ****’s progress
5. Finish Translating “Known For What We Do” and post.
6. Study Danish

As you can see, I put my schoolwork (Math and The Brothers Karamazov in top priority, because those were absolute musts for the day. Then came my secondary responsibilities, pertaining to the Rebelution Translation Project. Only after that did my truly optional task begin (Danish). Of course, your tasks and the order you put them in will be different, but I hope you get the gist.

After you write the list of things down on the Post-It, you should stick it somewhere where you will see it all day. Maybe that’s on the dashboard of your car, or on your fridge, or maybe you need to stick it to your body (I have to do that sometimes ). Then just follow the Post-It to the best of your ability (not that it’s a god or anything, but it is a guideline)

Pick it up to put it down

Of course, things rarely go completely according to plan. No matter how much we may try, we can never control the world. So that’s where another piece of my mom’s wisdom comes in: sometimes we make a plan just to practice laying it down. (Sorry, if that wasn’t her thought originally; she’s who I heard it from)

For example, on the day for the above Post-It that I wrote, I did not accomplish everything I had hoped. In fact, I only got through item 4; the rest had to wait until the next day. But that does not make that day a failure. That had been my fatal mistake: thinking of a day as a success if and only if I accomplished everything I had hoped for. Even though I didn’t finish all my tasks according to my list, but I did finish God’s list for me, which is the only important one. We must remember to “trade our dreams for His,” (Casting Crowns) but hopefully they’re not in conflict.