Why I'm timing every minute of my life

Part 1 of 3 in my Year of Time Tracking series

For an entire year now, I have had a timer running, tracking the main thing I was doing, every minute of every hour of every day. Whether I was sleeping, working, reading, travelling, catching up with friends, and even writing this very post, there was a timer running to record precisely¹ where I was spending my time.

Which, I’m aware, can sound like rather a lot.

So uh…

Why did I start doing this?

And why don’t I plan on stopping?

Reason 1 - Mortality and Meaning

On the wall in my room (back in the days when I had a room to call my own anyway²), sitting right above my desk, I have a Life Calendar. A grid of 1cm boxes - 52 wide, 90 down - each representing one week, or 168 hours in a 90 year life.

Much to my chagrin³, I only have a finite amount of time that I’ll be alive on this planet. I want to use that time well, and an important step towards better use of my time is understanding where I actually spend it i.e. How many minutes and hours do different activities, hobbies, tasks, and lifestyle choices cost in the long run. Having this data has been invaluable in making decisions about whether to take on new projects, or roles, for deciding which habits I want to focus on, and for being honest with myself about the trade-offs that are an inevitable part of life.

I want to make sure that the areas of my life that are the most important, are the areas I am actually putting the most time, money, and energy towards. I’ve already been tracking my finances for over 6 years⁴, and tracking energy seems a mite subjective, so enter Time Tracking.

Reason 2 - Intentionality

“Tom, if you’re so interested in using your time well, how do you justify all the time you spend time-tracking?” - [Several people I’ve talked about this with]

There are countless instances over the last year where I have gone to start a YouTube or Digital Wheelspinning⁵ timer, only to be confronted with what I’m about to do, and decide that I’d rather spend my time somewhere else.
Far from costing me time, in these moments Time Tracking is shifting my time spent from bad uses of my time⁶ to good⁷.

There is, of course, some friction to constantly running a timer. I’ve tried to minimise this where possible, which I’ll talk about more in part two. In one way though, I can use this friction to my advantage. People are bad at switching between tasks, and having to acknowledge (and take some time) when I’m doing this, has encouraged me to group similar tasks together more often. To put a fence around things like responding to emails and messages, or making phone calls, or doing small pieces of digital admin.
Since beginning Time Tracking I’m far more likely to focus on one specific activity for longer, and to group similar tasks, rather than be distracted by them as soon as they pop up.

Overall I find the immediate (and tangible) benefits of Time Tracking to be worth the (relatively low) cost. Once I factor in the longer term benefits from seeing where I spend my time and having data for long term decisions it feels like a huge improvement to my life, and an important part of my System-For-Being-A-Functional-Human.

So. That’s the Why of my Time Tracking, but How exactly do I make it as easy and as useful as possible?

Well dear reader, for that you’ll have to check out part two!

Ngā Mihi Nui,

Tom

1. A Gandalf kind of precisely…

2. Maybe a Story For Another Time

3. “n. Mental disquiet and pain from the failure of aims or plans” - Seems appropriate

4. Definitely a Story For Another Time

5. More on what that means in part two

6. Uses of my time less in line with who my higher self wants to be

7. Uses of my time more in line with who my higher self wants to be