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Time Margin: How to fit it all in??

Creating time margin for yourself and your dreams


I just lost an hour and a half.
 I was trying to help. I really was.
 Losing time
I was traveling with my son to an event that he needed to attend. We had agreed to leave the hotel at 6:30 to get him where he needed to be by 7:30. I was ready but he was distracted, I think he thought I was being too uptight leaving an hour to get to the event (It could be a thing). Anyway, I was ready and I grabbed his suit-jacket off the hanger and hung it on his suitcase rolling handle.
So, I get him out the door and between needing to get him food, getting lost twice, I got him to the event at 7:35. As he is getting out of the car he realized that he does not have his tie on so he looks in his bag. Then he realizes it is probably hanging on the hanger where his suit was (which Mom had failed to grab).
So… he went into his event and I drove back to get the tie and hanger from the hotel room. In trying to save a few minutes, by over mom-ing him, I got to spend an hour and a half driving back to the hotel. Getting the tie. Driving back to his event so he could be properly dressed.
If I had only let him manage himself, which he is very capable of doing, I would have saved myself an hour and a half and quarter tank of gas.
 
This made me think of where else in our lives do we create chaos or extra work because we are interfering or helping unnecessarily.?? If we are to find the time in our busy lives to live our dreams and passions this might be an area to look at.
 
So here are some things to think about to help create extra time and energy for you:

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Margin: A key to living a life you love

Creating Margin adds Peace and Joy to Life!

I believe that one of the keys to living a life you love is to have margin built into your life. Margin is also necessary to be able to take action on a dream.
 
So, what do I mean by margin? I define margin as the extra, intentionally unused space.
On a word processing document, you set the ‘margins’; which is the area your text and illustrations will stay within. Likewise in design, we use the term ‘white space’ or ‘ negative space’ to designate that part of the sign, ad or website that is between visual elements.
 
This creates balance, increases legibility, higher comprehension and increased attention to important messaging.
 
Likewise, in life, we need margin to be happy and content. Life happens. Things don’t go according to plan. Kids get sick. Mom calls just to chat. A shipment of a key resource gets delayed. Things always take longer than you think they will. These situations come up and the amount of margin in your life will determine if you can roll with the punches or if you are in a crisis situation. I believe that building margin is important in several key areas of life:

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168

We all have 168 hours a week.

Rich, poor, healthy, unhealthy, young, old — we all have the same number of hours a week.

What we choose to do with those hours will determine the life we lead. Work, family, friends, sleep, eating, relaxing and chores all have to fit into these set number of hours.

Along with the meaning of life; how best to spend the time you have available to you is one of the great philosophical questions of the ages. The answer to this question can vary from “Live for the Moment” to the ” Number your Days.” (The idea here is to count the number of days you have and to realize how short is the time you have left).

Many books and articles have been written on ways to manage your time, be more effective, get more things done, etc, etc, etc. I have read many of these books and tried many of the tactics.

I have started/stopped/failed/gave up/and started again.

I don’t know that I have anything NEW to add to the discussion. Yet, how we handle those 168 hours will have a HUGE impact on our ability to reach our dreams or even attempt to start the journey.

Here are some of my favorite bits of wisdom on the subject:

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Welcome!

 
Welcome to my first blog post.  I have so many ideas and topics that I want to write about that I am not quite sure
where to start.  So let me start with some ideas and vision for whereI hope to take this blog.
 
First, I want to be transparent with my struggles and challenges.  I hope by sharing these I can help other people overcome their challenges.  I am also hoping to start a discussion. To have you, my fellow dreamers, give ideas and advice that I can use and we can all share.
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What is a Dandelion Dream?


Have you ever had that thought, I would like to do _________ (fill in the blank). Usually, it is something highly impractical, expensive, huge in scope or just plain silly.  So the idea pops in your head and you think  “I can’t do that”.  But later, the same thought pops up. Just like a lone flower in the middle of your grass and you pull it up with “I don’t have time for that”.  But again you are perhaps on a long car ride and you have time to pondersingle dandelion in a lawn how wonderful it would be to do this thing.  In a perfect world, how successful you would be.  How happy and fulfilled you would be.  But you get to your designation and think “I don’t have the money to do that.”

I don’t have the expertise.
 
I have responsibilities.
 
I don’t know where to start.
 
Nobody would be interested in what I have to say.
 
This is foolish, be practical.
 
And each time we say this to ourselves we are pulling up the lone flower of our dream by its roots. 

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Just getting started

I am trying to set up my website and as you can see it is not going well. If you have the ability to help me then please send me an email at barbara@dandelion-dream.com.

Coming soon  . . . is a blog about reaching your dreams.  Do you remember being a child and thinking about the adult you would one day be and knowing you were going to do and be something special?  And then life happens. . . and more life happens. . .and you survive.  I want to start a conversation about remembering those ideas and beliefs.  To take all that life has given us and take action today to become the person we always knew we could be.

Come walk this journey with me.  There seems to be some rocks in my way currently but soon I will be up and running.  🙂