When people find out I write about time management, they assume two things. One is that I'm always on time, and I'm not. I have four small children, and I would like to blame them for my occasional tardiness, but sometimes it's just not their fault. I was once late to my own speech on time management.
Kada ljudi saznaju da pišem o upravljanju vremenom, pretpostavljaju dve stvari. Jedna je da uvek stižem na vreme, što nije tačno. Imam četvoro male dece i volela bih da ih okrivim za svoje povremeno kašnjenje, ali ponekad prosto nije njihova krivica. Jednom sam kasnila na sopstveni govor o upravljanju vremenom.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
We all had to just take a moment together and savor that irony.
Svi smo morali da zastanemo na trenutak i uživamo u toj ironiji.
The second thing they assume is that I have lots of tips and tricks for saving bits of time here and there. Sometimes I'll hear from magazines that are doing a story along these lines, generally on how to help their readers find an extra hour in the day. And the idea is that we'll shave bits of time off everyday activities, add it up, and we'll have time for the good stuff. I question the entire premise of this piece, but I'm always interested in hearing what they've come up with before they call me. Some of my favorites: doing errands where you only have to make right-hand turns --
Druga stvar koju pretpostavljaju je da imam mnogo saveta i trikova kako tu i tamo uštedeti malo vremena. Ponekad se čujem sa časopisima koji se bave pričom vezano za to, uglavnom o tome kako pomoći njihovim čitaocima da pronađu dodatnih sat vremena dnevno. Ideja je da ćemo skinuti malo vremena od svakodnevnih aktivnosti, sve to sabrati, a onda ćemo imati vremena za lepe stvari. Dovodim u pitanje čitavu pretpostavku ove priče, ali me uvek zanima da čujem šta su smislili pre nego što me pozovu. Ovo su neke od mojih omiljenih ideja: obavljanje poslova tako da skrećete samo udesno -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Being extremely judicious in microwave usage: it says three to three-and-a-half minutes on the package, we're totally getting in on the bottom side of that. And my personal favorite, which makes sense on some level, is to DVR your favorite shows so you can fast-forward through the commercials. That way, you save eight minutes every half hour, so in the course of two hours of watching TV, you find 32 minutes to exercise.
Vrlo pametno rasuđivati u pogledu korišćenja mikrotalasne - na pakovanju piše tri to tri i po minuta, a svi kapiramo lošu stranu toga. A lično moja omiljena ideja, koja donekle ima smisla, jeste snimati svoje omiljene serije tako da možete premotati reklame. Tako uštedite osam minuta na svakih pola sata, tako da tokom dva sata gledanja televizije nađete 32 minuta za vežbanje.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Which is true. You know another way to find 32 minutes to exercise? Don't watch two hours of TV a day, right?
Što je tačno. Znate još jedan način da nađete 32 minuta za vežbanje? Ne gledajte televiziju dva sata dnevno, zar ne?
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Anyway, the idea is we'll save bits of time here and there, add it up, we will finally get to everything we want to do. But after studying how successful people spend their time and looking at their schedules hour by hour, I think this idea has it completely backward. We don't build the lives we want by saving time. We build the lives we want, and then time saves itself.
Uglavnom, ideja je da ćemo uštedeti malo vremena tu i tamo, saberemo ga, i konačno ćemo moći da radimo sve što hoćemo. Međutim, nakon što sam izučavala koliko uspešno ljudi troše svoje vreme i gledala njihove rasporede sat za satom, mislim da je ova zamisao naopako postavljena. Mi ne gradimo život kakav želimo štedeći vreme. Mi gradimo život kakav želimo i onda se vreme samo štedi.
Here's what I mean. I recently did a time diary project looking at 1,001 days in the lives of extremely busy women. They had demanding jobs, sometimes their own businesses, kids to care for, maybe parents to care for, community commitments -- busy, busy people. I had them keep track of their time for a week so I could add up how much they worked and slept, and I interviewed them about their strategies, for my book.
Evo na šta mislim. Nedavno sam sprovela projekat dnevnika vremena gde sam pregledala 1001 dan u životu izuzetno zauzetih žena. Imale su zahtevne poslove, ponekad sopstvene firme, decu ili možda roditelje o kojima su se starale, obaveze u zajednici - veoma zauzete osobe. Zadala sam im da beleže svoje vreme tokom nedelju dana tako da mogu da saberem koliko su radile i spavale, i intervjuisala sam ih za svoju knjigu u vezi sa njihovim strategijama.
One of the women whose time log I studied goes out on a Wednesday night for something. She comes home to find that her water heater has broken, and there is now water all over her basement. If you've ever had anything like this happen to you, you know it is a hugely damaging, frightening, sopping mess. So she's dealing with the immediate aftermath that night, next day she's got plumbers coming in, day after that, professional cleaning crew dealing with the ruined carpet. All this is being recorded on her time log. Winds up taking seven hours of her week. Seven hours. That's like finding an extra hour in the day.
Jedna od žena čiji dnevnik sam proučavala izašla je u sredu uveče po nešto. Vraća se kući da bi shvatila da se njen bojler pokvario i sada je voda svuda po njenom podrumu. Ako vam se ikada ovako nešto dogodilo, znate da je to mokar i strašan haos koji stvara veliku štetu. Tako ona te noći rešava neposredne posledice, sledećeg dana dovede vodoinstalatera, a dan nakon toga profesionalni tim za čišćenje sređuje uništen tepih, Sve to je zabeleženo u njenom dnevniku vremena. Na kraju joj to oduzme sedam sati u nedelji. Sedam sati. To je kao da nađete dodatnih sat vremena dnevno.
But I'm sure if you had asked her at the start of the week, "Could you find seven hours to train for a triathlon?" "Could you find seven hours to mentor seven worthy people?" I'm sure she would've said what most of us would've said, which is, "No -- can't you see how busy I am?" Yet when she had to find seven hours because there is water all over her basement, she found seven hours. And what this shows us is that time is highly elastic. We cannot make more time, but time will stretch to accommodate what we choose to put into it.
Ipak, da ste je pitali na početku nedelje: „Da li bi mogla naći sedam sati da treniraš za triatlon?“ „Da li bi mogla naći sedam sati da budeš mentor sedam vrednih osoba?“, sigurna sam da bi rekla ono što bi rekla većina nas, a to je: „Ne, zar ne vidiš koliko sam zauzeta?“ A ipak, kada je morala da nađe sedam sati jer je bilo vode svuda po njenom podrumu, pronašla je sedam sati. Ovo nam pokazuje da je vreme vrlo rastegljivo. Ne možemo da stvorimo više vremena, ali vreme će se rastegnuti da se prilagodi onome što odlučimo da u njega unesemo.
And so the key to time management is treating our priorities as the equivalent of that broken water heater. To get at this, I like to use language from one of the busiest people I ever interviewed. By busy, I mean she was running a small business with 12 people on the payroll, she had six children in her spare time. I was getting in touch with her to set up an interview on how she "had it all" -- that phrase. I remember it was a Thursday morning, and she was not available to speak with me. Of course, right?
Dakle, ključ za upravljanje vremenom je ophođenje prema našim prioritetima kao jednakim pokvarenom bojleru. Da bih ovo objasnila, volim da upotrebim reči jedne od najzauzetijih osoba koju sam ikada intervjuisala. Pod zauzetošću podrazumevam da je predvodila malu fimu sa 12 ljudi na platnom spisku, a imala je šestoro dece u slobodno vreme. Stupala sam u kontakt sa njom da bih zakazala intervju o tome kako je „imala sve“ - to je ta fraza. Sećam se da je bio četvrtak ujutru i nije bila dostupna da razgovara sa mnom. Naravno, zar ne?
But the reason she was unavailable to speak with me is that she was out for a hike, because it was a beautiful spring morning, and she wanted to go for a hike. So of course this makes me even more intrigued, and when I finally do catch up with her, she explains it like this. She says, "Listen Laura, everything I do, every minute I spend, is my choice." And rather than say, "I don't have time to do x, y or z," she'd say, "I don't do x, y or z because it's not a priority." "I don't have time," often means "It's not a priority." If you think about it, that's really more accurate language. I could tell you I don't have time to dust my blinds, but that's not true. If you offered to pay me $100,000 to dust my blinds, I would get to it pretty quickly.
Međutim, razlog tome što nije bila dostupna da priča sa mnom je to što je izašla na pešačenje, jer je bilo lepo prolećno jutro i htela je da pešači. Naravno, to me je još više zaintrigiralo, a kada sam se konačno našla sa njom, ovako je to objasnila. Ona kaže: „Slušaj, Lora, sve što radim, svaki minut koji utrošim, moj je izbor.“ Umesto da kaže: „Nemam vremena da radim x, y ili z“, rekla bi: „Ne radim x, y ili z zato što to nije prioritet.“ „Nemam vremena“ često znači „to nije prioritet“. Ako razmislite o tome, to jeste tačnije rečeno. Mogla bih vam reći da nemam vremena da obrišem prašinu sa roletni, ali to nije tačno. Kada biste mi ponudili 100 000 dolara da obrišem roletne, prionula bih na to prilično hitro.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Since that is not going to happen, I can acknowledge this is not a matter of lacking time; it's that I don't want to do it. Using this language reminds us that time is a choice. And granted, there may be horrible consequences for making different choices, I will give you that. But we are smart people, and certainly over the long run, we have the power to fill our lives with the things that deserve to be there.
Pošto se to neće desiti, mogu da priznam da nije stvar u nedostatku vremena, već u tome da to ne želim da radim. Korišćenje ovog jezika nas podseća da je vreme izbor. Istina, može biti užasnih posledica za donošenje različitih odluka, to vam priznajem. No, mi smo pametni ljudi, i sigurno je da na duže staze imamo potencijal da ispunimo život stvarima koje zaslužuju da budu tu.
So how do we do that? How do we treat our priorities as the equivalent of that broken water heater?
Pa, kako da to uradimo? Kako da tretiramo svoje prioritete kao jednake pokvarenom bojleru?
Well, first we need to figure out what they are. I want to give you two strategies for thinking about this. The first, on the professional side: I'm sure many people coming up to the end of the year are giving or getting annual performance reviews. You look back over your successes over the year, your "opportunities for growth." And this serves its purpose, but I find it's more effective to do this looking forward. So I want you to pretend it's the end of next year. You're giving yourself a performance review, and it has been an absolutely amazing year for you professionally. What three to five things did you do that made it so amazing? So you can write next year's performance review now.
Pa, prvo moramo da otkrijemo šta su oni. Želim da vam iznesem dve strategije za razmišljanje o ovome. Prvo, sa profesionalne strane - sigurna sam da mnogi, kako se bližimo kraju godine, daju ili dobijaju godišnje ocene učinka. Pogledate unazad svoje uspehe tokom godine, svoje „prilike za razvoj“. To služi svojoj svrsi, ali smatram da je delotvornije raditi ovo gledajući napred. Hoću da se pretvarate da je kraj sledeće godine. Dajete sebi ocenu učinka, i to je za vas profesionalno bila apsolutno neverovatna godina. Koje tri do pet stvari ste radili zbog kojih je bila tako neverovatna? Možete sada da napišete procenu učinka za sledeću godinu.
And you can do this for your personal life, too. I'm sure many of you, like me, come December, get cards that contain these folded up sheets of colored paper, on which is written what is known as the family holiday letter.
To možete da uradite i za svoj lični život. Sigurna sam da mnogi među vama, poput mene, kad dođe decembar, dobijaju čestitke koje sadrže one savijene obojene papire na kojima je napisano ono što je poznato kao porodično praznično pismo.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Bit of a wretched genre of literature, really, going on about how amazing everyone in the household is, or even more scintillating, how busy everyone in the household is. But these letters serve a purpose, which is that they tell your friends and family what you did in your personal life that mattered to you over the year. So this year's kind of done, but I want you to pretend it's the end of next year, and it has been an absolutely amazing year for you and the people you care about. What three to five things did you do that made it so amazing? So you can write next year's family holiday letter now. Don't send it.
Pomalo je žalostan žanr književnosti koji govori o tome kako su svi ukućani neverovatni, ili, još sjajnije, koliko su svi ukućani zauzeti. Ipak, ova pisma služe svrsi, a to je da govore vašim prijateljima i porodici šta ste radili u ličnom životu što vam je bilo značajno tokom godine. Ova godina je maltene gotova, ali hoću da se pretvarate da je kraj sledeće godine, da je bila apsolutno neverovatna godina za vas i ljude do kojih vam je stalo. Koje tri do pet stvari ste radili zbog kojih je bila tako neverovatna? Možete sada da napišete praznično pismo porodice za sledeću godinu. Ne šaljite ga.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
Please, don't send it. But you can write it. And now, between the performance review and the family holiday letter, we have a list of six to ten goals we can work on in the next year.
Molim vas, ne šaljite ga, ali možete ga napisati. Sada, između procene učinka i porodičnog prazničnog pisma, imamo spisak od šest do deset ciljeva na kojima možemo raditi sledeće godine.
And now we need to break these down into doable steps. So maybe you want to write a family history. First, you can read some other family histories, get a sense for the style. Then maybe think about the questions you want to ask your relatives, set up appointments to interview them. Or maybe you want to run a 5K. So you need to find a race and sign up, figure out a training plan, and dig those shoes out of the back of the closet. And then -- this is key -- we treat our priorities as the equivalent of that broken water heater, by putting them into our schedules first. We do this by thinking through our weeks before we are in them.
Treba da ih podelimo na izvodljive korake. Možda želite da napišete porodičnu istoriju. Najpre možete da pročitate istorije nekih drugih porodica, da steknete utisak o stilu. Onda možda razmislite o pitanjima koja biste postavili srodnicima i dogovorite sastanke da biste ih intervjuisali. Ili možda hoćete da učestvujete u trci na pet kilometara. Treba da pronađete trku i prijavite se, osmislite plan treniranja i iskopate patike sa dna ormara. A zatim - ovo je ključno - tretiramo svoje prioritete kao jednake pokvarenom bojleru, tako što ih stavimo na prvo mesto u rasporedu. To radimo tako što promislimo nedelje pre nego što one nastupe.
I find a really good time to do this is Friday afternoons. Friday afternoon is what an economist might call a "low opportunity cost" time. Most of us are not sitting there on Friday afternoons saying, "I am excited to make progress toward my personal and professional priorities right now."
Smatram da je veoma dobro vreme za ovo petak popodne. Petak popodne je nešto što bi ekonomisti mogli nazvati vreme „malog oportunitetnog troška“. Većina nas ne sedi petkom popodne govoreći: „Uzbuđena sam što napredujem ka svojim ličnim i profesionalnim prioritetima u ovom trenutku.“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
But we are willing to think about what those should be. So take a little bit of time Friday afternoon, make yourself a three-category priority list: career, relationships, self. Making a three-category list reminds us that there should be something in all three categories. Career, we think about; relationships, self -- not so much. But anyway, just a short list, two to three items in each. Then look out over the whole of the next week, and see where you can plan them in.
No, spremni smo da razmišljamo o tome šta bi oni trebalo da budu. Stoga uzmite malo vremena od petka popodne, napravite sebi spisak prioriteta od tri kategorije: karijera, odnosi, lične stvari. Sastavljanje spiska od tri kategorije podseća nas da nešto treba da postoji u svakoj od tri kategorije. O karijeri razmišljamo, a o odnosima sa drugima i o sebi ne naročito. Uglavnom, samo kratka lista, dve do tri stavke u svakoj. Zatim sagledajte ceo period tokom sledeće nedelje i vidite gde možete da ih isplanirate.
Where you plan them in is up to you. I know this is going to be more complicated for some people than others. I mean, some people's lives are just harder than others. It is not going to be easy to find time to take that poetry class if you are caring for multiple children on your own. I get that. And I don't want to minimize anyone's struggle. But I do think that the numbers I am about to tell you are empowering.
Gde ih planirate je na vama. Znam da će ovo biti komplikovanije za neke ljude nego ostalima. Mislim, život pojedinih osoba je prosto teži od života drugih. Neće biti lako naći vremena za pohađanje časova poezije ako se starate o nekoliko svoje dece. Razumem to. Ne želim da potcenjujem bilo čije napore. Ipak, mislim da brojevi koje ću vam navesti daju snagu.
There are 168 hours in a week. Twenty-four times seven is 168 hours. That is a lot of time. If you are working a full-time job, so 40 hours a week, sleeping eight hours a night, so 56 hours a week -- that leaves 72 hours for other things. That is a lot of time. You say you're working 50 hours a week, maybe a main job and a side hustle. Well, that leaves 62 hours for other things. You say you're working 60 hours. Well, that leaves 52 hours for other things. You say you're working more than 60 hours. Well, are you sure?
U nedelji je 168 sati. Dvadeset četiri puta sedam je 168 sati. To je mnogo vremena. Ako radite puno radno vreme, dakle, 40 sati nedeljno, spavate osam sati noću, dakle, 56 sati nedeljno - ostaje 72 sata za druge stvari. To je mnogo vremena. Kažete da radite 50 sati nedeljno, možda glavni posao i poslić sa strane. Pa, to ostavlja 62 sata za druge stvari. Kažete da radite 60 sati. Pa, to ostavlja 52 sata za druge stvari. Kažete da radite više od 60 sati. Pa, jeste li sigurni?
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
There was once a study comparing people's estimated work weeks with time diaries. They found that people claiming 75-plus-hour work weeks were off by about 25 hours.
Bilo je sprovedeno istraživanje koje je upoređivalo procenjene radne nedelje ljudi pomoću dnevnika vremena. Otkrili su da su ljudi koji tvrde da rade 75 i više sati nedeljno grešili za oko 25 sati.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
You can guess in which direction, right? Anyway, in 168 hours a week, I think we can find time for what matters to you. If you want to spend more time with your kids, you want to study more for a test you're taking, you want to exercise for three hours and volunteer for two, you can. And that's even if you're working way more than full-time hours.
Pretpostavljate u kom pravcu, zar ne? Uglavnom, u 168 sati nedeljno, mislim da možete naći vremena za ono do čega vam je stalo. Ako želite da provodite više vremena sa decom, ako želite da više učite za ispit koji polažete, želite da vežbate tri sata i volontirate dva sata, to i možete. Čak i ako radite mnogo više od punog radnog vremena.
So we have plenty of time, which is great, because guess what? We don't even need that much time to do amazing things. But when most of us have bits of time, what do we do? Pull out the phone, right? Start deleting emails. Otherwise, we're puttering around the house or watching TV.
Dakle, imamo dosta vremena, što je sjajno, jer znate šta? Čak nam i ne treba toliko vremena za neverovatne stvari. Međutim, kada većina nas ima malo vremena, šta radimo? Izvadimo telefon, je l' tako? Počnemo da brišemo imejlove. Pored toga se vrzmamo po kući ili gledamo TV.
But small moments can have great power. You can use your bits of time for bits of joy. Maybe it's choosing to read something wonderful on the bus on the way to work. I know when I had a job that required two bus rides and a subway ride every morning, I used to go to the library on weekends to get stuff to read. It made the whole experience almost, almost, enjoyable. Breaks at work can be used for meditating or praying. If family dinner is out because of your crazy work schedule, maybe family breakfast could be a good substitute.
Međutim, mali trenuci mogu imati veliku snagu. Možete koristiti svoje kratke trenutke za kratka uživanja. Možda je to izbor da čitate nešto divno u autobusu na putu ka poslu. Kada sam imala posao koji je zahtevao dve vožnje autobusom i vožnju metroom svakog jutra, imala sam običaj da idem u biblioteku vikendom da nabavim stvari za čitanje. To je čitavo to iskustvo učinilo skoro prijatnim. Pauze na poslu se mogu koristiti za meditaciju ili molitvu. Ako porodična večera otpada zbog vašeg ludog rasporeda na poslu, možda porodični doručak može biti dobra zamena.
It's about looking at the whole of one's time and seeing where the good stuff can go. I truly believe this. There is time. Even if we are busy, we have time for what matters. And when we focus on what matters, we can build the lives we want in the time we've got.
Radi se o sagledavanju celokupnog vremena osobe i uviđanju gde mogu da stanu lepe stvari. Iskreno verujem u to. Ima vremena. Čak i ako smo zauzeti, imamo vremena za ono što je važno. A kada se usredsredimo na ono što je važno, možemo sagraditi živote kakve želimo u okviru vremena koje imamo.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)