Introduction
1 - Master Potential
2 - Master Goals
3 - Master Time
4 - Master Money & Work
5 - Master Small Business
6 - Master Real Estate
7 - Master Health
8 - Master Mind
9 - Master Relationships
10 - Master Life
Conclusion

Lesson Three - Master Time

Operational Guidelines

By managing your time, you are managing your life.
Don't procrastinate. Get started and stay focused.
Concentrate on your strengths.
Be brutally honest and think as a realist.
Work at work.
Marshall your forces; partner, hire, delegate and lead.

   If it is to be, start now.

   Mastering time is choosing to live your life on purpose: awake, alert and aware of what you're doing and why you are doing it. Having a purpose and being focused on specific objectives gives you a huge advantage moving forward. Make your choices, write down your goals and start taking action. Get in the game. Review, adjust and learn as you progress. Get going.

   Whether you want to become a lawyer or an electrician, a Green Beret or a scratch golfer, take action. Get going. The information from active practitioners is out there. Find it. Test yourself against it. Interview those who are doing or who have done what you want to do. Really be sure of what you want. Start getting dirty. If you want to be in the Special Forces, see if you have the nerve to go skydiving. If you want to be a poet, see if your rhymes hold up to scrutiny at a coffeehouse open mike night. Having a clearly defined purpose, you are blessed. Embrace the work. Live your life. Love the journey.

   Become a college graduate or a black belt in four years. Become a licensed scuba diver in a month or an airplane pilot in under a year. Become a nurse in two years or an EMT in six months.

   What others have done, you can do. Who or what is stopping you? As a Master of Success, you are determined to complete your life mission on your terms.

   Tell the world that you are weak and the world believes you. If you say you are too old to become a medical doctor, everyone believes you. If you say that you're too fat to run a marathon, everyone believes you. If you say you are too far in debt ever to recover, everyone believes you.

   Never give up. Soldier on. You can make the choice. You can lay back and waste today and tomorrow and every day of your life. Or, you can quietly show the world your abilities and strong will. You can take a first step and then another.

   Manage your time and manage your life. Let the past represent the old you. Free the new you, ready to burst forth! In your past, you may have been misguided or overwhelmed or have screwed up. That was then. Now, you are awakened, a different person. Now, you have clearly defined goals. So, research and find kindred souls and mentors. Plan your attack. If you need to prepare before advancing, do that. If you are ready to go, go.

   If you need to return to school for a year to retake courses to qualify for a teaching degree, do it. If you are in a wheelchair but want to become a martial artist and three karate schools blow you off, there are a lot of other schools. You will find one who will work with you. Do it. If a bad credit score is hurting your chances for a small business loan, find out your financing options and start making amends. Do it. Without excuses, make this the defining moment of awakening when everything changes.

   As you do your research, you may find new exciting opportunities that never occurred to you. You had thought about becoming a film director but discover that you really love set design. You wanted to become a coach but discover the rewards of being an athletic trainer. You thought about moving to a large city to become a developer but you start finding many construction opportunities in the suburbs. Discovery makes your life exciting. Research is time well spent.

   Your life is filled with nothing but time to be used productively or wasted. Carpe Diem means to seize the day. Make today and every day special. For a Master of Success, nothing is over. Everything is beginning. If you intend some day to do it, begin now.

There is never enough time to get everything done. Prioritize the important and save time and stress by not doing what doesn't need to be done and delegating and partnering when appropriate. Finish what you start. Do the priority task and the toughest jobs first.

Go to the Source

Get the information you need to make your own informed decision. This is your one life to live fully. Save time. Save your life. Do your own investigation. If you want to be a horse trainer or a Hollywood agent, your grandmother or the local auto mechanic are not your best informational resources. Talk to actual horse trainers and Hollywood agents. Join associations. Go to events. Volunteer. Find a way to interact with others in your field. With firsthand experience, honestly, identify the plusses and minuses, the good and the bad, the harsh realities and the glories of pursing your goals.

Whatever it takes, you are prepared to do it. Take internships. Go for coffee. Work in the mail room. Babysit the boss's kids. If they ask you to scrub toilets, you smile and ask for the brush. Show your mettle to those with the power to move your career forward. With eyes and ears open, be where the action is.

Wax on. Wax off.

With an open mind and an honest heart, self-test your commitment. Do I really want to do this? Do I have the skills and the resources? Do I have the proper mindset? It is better to change your mind, to realign your thinking, to make new plans, than to keep trudging down the wrong path.

Stick with Reality

   By taking the time for daily reflection, you adjust your thinking. In the real world, everything is not beautiful in its own way. Some economically devastated areas may not recover in your lifetime. Some products are obsolete and worthless. Some causes can't be supported. Some bosses are idiots who play favorites. You are a thinking person of action. So, think. Pick your shots. Consider your strengths and weaknesses and the marketplace. Pause. Gather information. Consider options. Decide. Act. Maybe you should relocate or find new partners or get more training or start again.

   Test your ideas. Put your toe in the water. Starting a professional curling league in the tropics is a dumb idea. Many will tell you that this is a dumb idea. They are correct; listen. Before putting your life savings into the concept, see if consumers really want the trees on their properties painted neon colors. When a hundred per cent of prospects tell you that they are not interested in your innovative product or service, listen.

   Because you can do a lot does not mean that you can do everything. Get real. No matter how much you want it, you cannot impose your will on cats to make them use the house toilet. No matter how excellent your translations, there are still very few professorships in Latin. No matter how much you believe in the law, if you start a legal practice specializing in defending terrorists, you will get noticed and you will get singled out for societal revulsion. Accept reality. Proceed forewarned.

Start Organizing

   Now, start the ongoing process of organizing your information.

   What needs to be done? What's the plan?

   If in five years, you want to open your own beauty spa, you start sweeping and then cutting hair. You learn the business from top to bottom. You learn about makeup and massage and facials and manicures and pedicures. You study general business management and specific salon management. You observe how the best stylists and therapists treat their clients. You read books and magazines and join associations and talk to vendors. You start saving. You work sixty hours a week. You stop drinking four dollar lattés or trade your BMW for a Hyundai. The extra work and/or sacrifices may not be what you want to do, just what you need to do. Find a way to complete the mission. Get started doing what needs to be done. This is the time. This is the character of the Master of Success. I'll figure this out. I'll do it.

   If you want to get into medical school and you previously flunked biology, you have a problem. You need to repeat biology and, this time, get an A. Then, you have to take micro-biology and advanced micro-biology to prove that the first time you failed basic biology was a fluke. Show the admissions board your commitment to go from underachiever to extraordinary. Prove yourself to those holding the keys to your future. There is no mystery. You need to ace biology. You don't pretend. You do what needs to be done.

   If it's for you, then, find the path to becoming a physician. Are you talking to admissions directors and asking doctors about their training experiences? Are you buying and previewing the textbooks that you will be using in future courses? Will you be working or volunteering at health clinics or hospitals? Be where the action is. Beg or borrow. Be prepared, willing and anxious to study and work harder than is necessary to qualify. Let the decision makers be inspired by your passion. Keep going until you hear, "Yes" and you get your chance to prove your commitment. Don't sit on your laurels but take the next step. Find physicians, maybe lots of physicians, who believe that you'd make a good doctor. Attach their testimonials to your application. Ask them to intercede on your behalf. Keep studying. Keep networking until you are accepted or have exhausted all possibilities. Then, think up more possibilities. Make your dream into your reality. Write your own narrative.

   Let's say you want to become a real estate tycoon. You aren't a sleepy daydreamer. You are a man or woman of action. Perhaps you work all day at your regular job as a postal worker and then go to your second job stocking shelves and then go home and look at property listings. This is a masterly commitment. Don't complain about it. Do it. In your free time, are you also talking to realtors and networking with established area investors? Are you also reading real estate books, watching instructional videos and taking home improvement courses? Yes, this is a success plan. This is all good stuff. This is time well spent. Others may think you're crazy. Maybe you are and you love it.

   If you want to be in the Special Forces, start your own training regime. Get up in the middle of the night and hike fifteen miles. If it happens to be in the middle of a winter's snow storm, feel the cold and the pain and smile because this is what makes you special. Others may think you're crazy. Maybe you are and you love it.

   In a few years when you are a doctor or a Green Beret or own a successful spa, others will covet what you have accomplished. Smile and thank them. If they persist, introduce them to the Action Principles^®.

Having done the research, you organize a plan of what needs to be done. With character and courage, find the path and walk the path or forever hold your peace. With strength and confidence, following the Action Principles^®, God willing, there will be few obstacles that you can't overcome. Your goals will become your objectives, which become your daily prioritized to-do list.

Practical Time Management

   If all you do is plan, you will end up unaccomplished. Being a Master of Success is about taking informed action. You need to take decisive direct action based upon your research. Look to your Action Principles^®; break down your next goal into manageable objectives that will form your to-do list.

   If your next interim step is to complete a course, where and when is it offered? Can you take the course online? How much does it cost? Are there any course comments posted by former students? Investigate. Make the plan.

   Stone by stone by stone, you tentatively place your foot onto the next rock. You establish your balance and you advance. If your advancement calls for saving $20,000 or losing fifty pounds, what is your plan to mission completion?

   You make the money or lose the weight in small increments. You need twenty thousand dollars to buy cinematography equipment to make your first documentary film. You volunteer for overtime for three months and make a thousand dollars and you are a thousand dollars closer to your goal; the $20,000 becomes $19,000. In addition, you park your car and take public transportation and you brown bag your lunch. You save another five hundred. You now need $18,500. You don't complain or feel sorry for yourself. Step by step, dollar by dollar, pound by pound, course by course, contact by contact, you do what needs to be done.

Concentrate on the task at hand. Finish what you start. Complete each mission 100%. When you find a problem, if you can correct it, you immediately correct it.

   You want to join the Marines but the Marines prefer recruits to be less than two hundred and twenty pounds. You weigh 270. So, you huff and puff and starve and suffer and in a few months, guess what? This is your dream to one day stand beside the few and the proud. You do what needs to be done before applying to the Marines.

   Have you got what it takes to suffer for your art or for your corps? Answer the question. Will you someday walk on the stage to receive your Oscar for your documentary film? Will you someday proudly wear the Marine globe, eagle and anchor as a battle hardened defender of freedom? You decide. You can choose to step back into the crowd of unaccomplished bystanders or you can summon the will to keep trying.

   Today, what are you going to do to advance your cause?

   Organize your days with a prioritized to-do list. Use your cell phone or a notebook or index cards. The recording method isn't important. Each day becomes significant and each day brings you one day closer to realizing your goals.

   You have missions to accomplish; write them down.

   Save your daily to-do lists for regular review. It's educational and motivational to see the steps that you have taken to reach your objectives. Your reviews will keep you grounded and humble as you realize the mistakes you made on your road to eventual success. In the future, reflection will make you a better teacher and mentor. As a Master of Success, you will help others as you have been helped.

A Boring Life Is Your Fault

   With objectives, goals and a purpose, you will never be bored. You will be alive and ready to grow and change. You will be excited by the prospect of moving outside your comfort zone. Life is not standing still waiting for you. You will venture forth to find your potential.

   Some people waste hours.

   Some people waste their entire lives.

   As a Master of Success, you gather information, consider options and take decisive action. You gain confidence. And as your confidence grows through knowledge and experience, you become better at decision-making. You become increasingly proficient in separating the urgent and the important from the interesting but inconsequential.

   Time management through organization helps you stay on mission. To get into medical school, facility in the biological sciences is urgent, essential and non-negotiable. Gaining expertise is mandatory. Worrying about the type of laptop you will use is unimportant and thinking about the trendy scrub suits you will wear is stupid.

   Twiddling and dithering are hallmarks of the unaccomplished. Well thought through written goals formulated into realistic plans backed with decisive action is the answer. Without clear goals, ambition or firm direction, the tendency will be to spend too much time doing small easy tasks, leaving insufficient time and energy for the larger, more difficult and, perhaps, more demanding but important projects.

Common Time Wasters

Here are a few typical time wasters to guard against:

Not planning or poor planning
Lack of self-discipline
Not prioritizing tasks
Mistakes
Pointless meetings
Perfectionism
Poor communication
Equipment failure
Unwarranted demands by or on others
Not listening or ignoring instructions
Socializing during work time
Inability to say "No"
Inability to make decisions
Inability to delegate
Lack of motivation or interest
Procrastination

Be a person of action. Demand excellence of yourself. Be the example for others.

Make a decision to handle papers once. Return calls and emails within 24 hours.

Time is Your Life

By committing to personal mastery, you will win many races without having to feel inadequate when you don't win them all. You don't have to go to an Ivy League college, become the company president, drive an expensive car or live in a huge house to be successful. Spending your time acquiring grander and grander possessions is a hopeless trap. The guy with the big boat is probably spending most of his time working on it. Work to your own personal mastery level and relax. When you have a nice house, a vacation property, one or two nice cars and reasonable savings for emergencies and retirement, you are a winner. You have won the financial game. Now, if you truly love your work, keep working. But, with financial independence, you will also have the very nice option of spending more of your time on your hobbies, family and helping others. This is mastering time.

Benefits of Time Management

   As you've learned, if you are organizing your days by means of a written daily to-do list and reading your mission statement every day, you are among a small elite. Be proud of yourself for making this important choice.

   To understand how to master time, continue to examine how productively you are spending your time. For example, if you are an average American adult, you now spend four hours per night watching television. Is this the life you want? Can you plan your television viewing so that you are watching only the programs that you really want to watch? Most cable companies now offer digital video recording equipment which allows you to watch just what you want, just when you want to watch it. The Internet is a wonderful research and entertainment medium but also a seductive consumer of your time.

   How would your personal relationships, your family and society benefit from your having extra time to contribute?

   Don't get into the bad habit of giving up your sleep. You will find some people who claim to get only 3-5 hours of sleep per night. However, watching infomercials at 4a.m. and then spending the day walking around in a semi-brain fog and being grouchy are not conducive to successful living. Sleep is restorative. For the majority of people, getting less than 7-8 hours of sleep is not a time management skill to develop. Sleep deprivation can make you cranky, weak, sick and old before your time. Some high achievers swear by fifteen or twenty minute afternoon "cat naps."

The old monk who was working in his garden was asked what he would do if he knew that today was the last day of his life and the monk replied, "I'd work on my garden." To the master, spending time is not complicated; you simply continue to do what you know you should be doing. Continue the journey being the best you.

Using An Activity Log

   Many time management systems advocate the use of an activity log. Over the course of a week, you record each activity throughout the day. Are you working, eating, sleeping, primping, planning, traveling, or gossiping? The log is supposed to identify non-productive patterns of behavior that you can alter.

   Don't kid yourself.

   It is clear that most people don't need a log to tell themselves ways to improve. Most are painfully aware of what changes they should be making. They just have to commit to those changes and they have to be persistent for the 21 days that it takes to replace an old, bad habit with a new, good habit. For example, reading business books is a positive activity. If you can't find enough time to read, you can buy or download audio books or subscribe to podcasts. Sometimes drive time talk shows are funny and sometimes tedious. When they get repetitive, turn them off and start studying. This is a choice.

   If you don't pay bills until you have four copies of each, you will be deluged with paperwork. Make the choice to pay bills on the day they arrive. Handle paper once. Take charge of your desktop. Clean your desktop before you leave each night.

   If you take an hour for lunch and just gab, take a half-hour and gab. Be aware of how you are spending your time so that you can make the best choices for yourself.

Getting Organized

   Get organized. People respect organization. Being organized, you will find yourself with less stress and with more room, time and money. The heart of organization goes right back to goal setting and planning. Know what you want. Prioritize. Guard your work time. Eliminate interruptions. Get the job done with a positive mental attitude and don't get distracted arguing or socializing.

   Put a price on your time and interests. Spend your time doing what you want to do. What smaller jobs can you have others do so that you can concentrate on higher priority tasks? You may find that hiring others to do ordinary tasks for you is not an expense but a cost-effective investment. If you hate housekeeping, hire a cleaning service. If you don't like mowing the lawn, hire a landscaping company. In most areas, you can find a host of service providers from dog walkers to handymen to grocery delivery services to nannies to personal shoppers.

   How about your job situation? If you are being constantly interrupted and getting bogged down on routine tasks, you may benefit from hiring a secretary or a personal assistant. If you are engaged in a big project, hiring temporary workers may be warranted. Hiring exceptional personnel will produce long-term dividends for you and your company. If you see a hard worker with a pleasant personality at the convenience store or deli or the bank or anywhere, this may be a person that you'd like to hire.

   You live in a world of technological wonders. You must have a computer, a cell phone, a laptop, and some type of PDA. Look for other equipment gadgets and cell apps that can make your life and job easier. Can you make use of an electronic organizer, digital camera, Blackberry, fax machine, GPS, mini-voice recorder, iPod or iPad? Can you eliminate meetings and communicate via video conferencing?

   As an organized person you will find that you will be doing one task at a time. You will make sure that you know what to do before you start a job so that you don't waste time doing the wrong thing. Your objective is to take enough time to do things right the first time.

Learning to Say No

   Are you in control of your time or are your parents, children, spouse, bosses, employees, friends, television or addictions controlling your life? In the midst of the chaos of modern life, there are a lot of people, places and things vying for your attention. What do you want to do or have to do? Your daily to-do list enables you to prioritize the people and activities in your life.

   Bring your schedule and calendar with you to meetings. Defend your schedule, your goals, your plans, and your to-do list. If you can avoid it, don't say, "I'll get back to you." This creates a future obligation and more work. If you can make a decision on the spot, do that. If you have the authority, weigh commitments to new projects carefully before agreeing to them. Be prepared when requests are made of your time and resources. Does the task fit with your priorities and skills? Will the new task interfere with your present workload? Do you understand the specific requirements of the task? Are the time and performance expectations realistic? The best time to deal with any potential problem is before you assume responsibility for the task.

   Discourage people from just dropping in and interrupting your work. If you have a secretary or assistant, he or she can take messages and arrange appointments for you. Voice mail and e-mail have a place in protecting your work time. Be sure that you have the skills, time and resources to complete requests before accepting them and allowing them to interfere with current projects.

How To Delegate

Delegating means to pass responsibility to others. Delegating helps you to concentrate on what you do best and allows you to think, plan and improve organizational efficiency. You delegate tasks that are cost and time effective for others to do for you. You also delegate tasks that people can do better than you can. You get a lot done. You can accomplish more when others help. Whether you are leading your family, company or softball team, you must be able to delegate assignments.

Here are a few suggestions on effective delegating:

Match the right person to the right task.
Explain as precisely as possible your expectations for the task.
Establish a date when you expect the task to be completed.
Be sure that sufficient time and resources are available to complete the task.
Ask the person to assume responsibility for the task.
Encourage feedback if problems develop.
Ensure that the person understands the task and due date.
Schedule times and methods for checks and updates.
Say, "Thank you."
Follow up.

How To Manage Projects

As you plan, you will be translating your goals into manageable sized projects. You will do this by asking yourself a number of questions:

Exactly what has to be done?
How important is the project to you and the company?
Who is assuming responsibility for the project?
Is there a deadline? Is there a start date?
What is the estimated time for the completion of the project?
How much will it cost and do you have the resources?
Besides money, what other resources are needed and are they on hand?
How will success be measured?
What projects will be postponed to complete this project?
What are my options for completing the project?
With whom can I brainstorm?
To whom can I delegate?

Go Hardcore

   You are extraordinary. You have a life mission to accomplish. You need to master time.

   Organize each day with a prioritized to-do list. Focus on the matter at hand. Research and break down your goals into manageable objectives. Get going. Be aware of time wasting activities. Put a price on your time. Learn to say no. Learn to delegate. Spend your time doing what you want to do. Do not get sucked into other people's dramas.

   Be brutally honest with yourself. Rely on yourself. Be tough on yourself. Live to a high standard. Save yourself from the weight of an entitlement mentality. As one tough, thoughtful, spiritual, person of action, make your own successful life happen.