Wednesday, January 16, 2019

Prioritization of the Allocation of Time


Prioritizing Time Allocation to Achieve Goals in Life [i]

Som Karamchetty

Overview:
     People usually complain that they did not or do not have time to do certain things. Older people, like me, complain that we were not taught certain things when we were children. We did not know what we did with all that time.
     The reality is that in most cases, people are not conscious of time as a resource that they have to control its use or prioritize how much time they would like to allocate to various tasks at hand. Time is not like flowing water that you could dam or other capture in buckets and store for later use. It is more like sunshine; it goes fast and cares little what you do.
     Before the prioritization exercise, people have to list the tasks way ahead of time. This means that a plan is needed that sets strategic goals for life, analyzing the knowledges and skills needed to achieve those goals, and setting priorities to executing those tasks at each stage of life. Lacking such a plan and discipline to execute it, we will waste our time by the minutes and hours in the days and the days and months in our lives.
     Specific skills are prerequisites to pursue certain pursuits. This requires sequencing of tasks. Therefore, it is best to schedule the accomplishment of some tasks in early life in order to gain skills and capabilities in a progressive manner. It means that certain tasks should be scheduled and performed during early life. Thus, identification of skills and capabilities needed and the correct timing in life for their acquisition, and then the scheduling of tasks to acquire those capabilities and skills are essential for a highly successful and enjoyable life. This leads to the prioritization of time allocation to tasks to achieve goals in life.  This sequence is explained in the following sections.

Time is a critical resource:
    Whether it is a small chore or a major objective in life, it takes time to accomplish it.  In daily life and in our professional careers, we allocate time either consciously or thoughtlessly. But, unfortunately, we do not pay due attention to time and pay a huge price for such disrespect for time. We treat it like we have all the time in the world.
     If we take an incisive look at the life spans of people, we realize that it is indefinite. We do not know when the supply of time we have will be switched of.  As stated before, it is not a resource that we can borrow from others or store for later use. Time can neither be bought from others for our use nor can it be sold or given away for use by others. Yes! One can donate blood and organs (even after death) but not time. Surely, we can waste time in a variety of meaningless pursuits.

Resources Critical to Life:
     Other resources, such as money, are also critical to life. But, these resources are both storable and exchangeable. Our lives can be divided roughly into three phases. During childhood and old age, we cannot accomplish any tasks to accumulate resources needed to live a successful life. We do all our efforts only during the middle span to earn resources to sustain life during that span and the latter part of our lives. Another characteristic is that we have to assume that we need resources for a long old age and a short span of life to earn and store those resources. This characteristic is imposed by the uncertainty of one’s life span.
      Since time is critical to accomplishing personal goals, prioritizing its allocation to tasks is critical to success in life. Hence, we need to plan the allocation of this very critical resource. We should set goals for the acquisition of these other resources so that the resources can be traded during our life time as necessary. Then, for executing the necessary tasks to the accomplishment of those goals, we can allocate time on a prioritized basis.

Set Goals at Each Stage of Life:
Inheritance of Genes:
     People inherit the genes from their parents and this process decides certain basic bodily attributes to start with. Genes play an important role in one’s life in terms of certain abilities and disabilities one is endowed with. If one has good abilities, one should thank the parents. It may be worthwhile compensating the parents through some means for their donation of good genes. If one has bad abilities, one should be nice to parents so that they may compensate in some other way. A person can perhaps do nothing about having been given bad genes. Hopefully, certain genomic treatments under current scientific research may help one in the future. The important point is to make sure that we do not give bad genes to our children if we know that they might get them from us.
Body growth from age minus 10 months to year one or two:
     From the time of conception to the time of birth, mothers take full charge of the growth of a child’s body. Thereafter during the first couple of years after birth, mother and others who nurse the baby help them in terms of bodily growth. This is also the time, when they can help the child in terms of their knowledge and skill acquisition foundations.
Brain growth:
     It is important to realize that brain growth is also in the hands of the parents, family, and the environment in these early months and years. In other words, these people help the child with strong and positive mental growth.
Early Childhood Development (from age two to five years):
     During this period, a child begins to develop likes and dislikes. Children might develop some attitudes that can be helpful or not to their positive growth. Parents, guardians, family, relatives, friends, and the society influence the growth of the child’s body and mind. Some children develop a strong interest in music, games, reading, inquisitiveness, and other positive and beneficial knowledges and skills.
     It is at this stage, some children develop naughty and behavioral problems. They may be asking for more of everything and exhibit a complete lack of discipline. If parents treat a child like a precious toy and surrender to their whims, they would create an expensive doll that is only good for the shelf for life.
Childhood through Adolescence and Teens:
     This is the period when children get an opportunity to gain basic knowledge through education and develop attitudes and a variety of life skills. But, it is also the period when they can go astray and acquire a variety of bad habits that inhibit their capabilities to play an acceptable, a respected, and a productive life in the society. Some children exhibit their gained attitudes, knowledges, and skills very soon and if they are negative, there is potential for quick correction. If, on the other hand, such negative skills are kept latent, (or ignored, excused, and hidden by parents) they could lead to a rough and dangerous life for the young person.
Youth:
     This is the period when people gain their educational qualifications that lead to good careers. They realize that 1. Money is needed to satisfy their needs and wants; 2. Money comes only by doing jobs, and 3. Jobs would require appropriate knowledges, skills, abilities, and attitude. Such realization leads to prioritizing the allocation of time to the right tasks on their list.
     Thus, in all these stages, a child has to learn and start practicing the allocation of time to various tasks they are pursuing. Unfortunately, in most cases, children as well as youth pay no attention to time and even think that they have a huge amount of time ahead of them to dispense with it as they like. In some instances, even parents encourage the acquisition of bad usage of time by saying, “He is still young and he has plenty of time to learn.”
     Good arborists know that the growth of a tree can be shaped when it is still a plantlet. They pay good attention to the growth of the tree from the time of selection of the seeds, the soil, the environment, the orientation, the use of fertilizers, application of pesticides, training the growth (as well as pruning) of the branches, and so on. Once the tree becomes mature, there is not much corrective action they can do even if the tree is deficient in some respects. In the worst case, the tree becomes used as firewood or mulch.
     To turn a tree into an espalier, its branches have to be properly restrained and guided while it is still tender. In a similar manner, if a child wants to be a gymnast, their muscles and tendons have to be trained while they are still young and pliable. For a future singer, the vocal chords need the training very early in life. For a future writer, the brain has to be conditioned in childhood for good reading, comprehension, and writing.
     Youth can learn from this analogy and focus on the right things that should be done at the right time and by prioritizing the allocation of time to critical tasks.
Good retirement life and savings:
     People like to retire at some point in time and lead or continue to lead a good life as seniors. But, if one waits till that time, it will be too late. There must be a plan and saving of funds necessary for that planned life. If there is neither a plan nor savings, one will drag oneself into retirement and life could be a real burden and no enjoyable retirement. Hence, planning for retirement should be made while one is pursuing an active career and earning income.
Paying back debts – supporting parents:
     It is obvious that one can pay off debts when one is earning income. It is likely that people have borrowed funds to pay for college in their youth when they had little income. These types of loans are obvious but not the unwritten ones. The funds spent by parents beyond their means are such unwritten debts. It is possible that some parents had forsaken saving funds for their own retirement but spent such sums on the education of their children. People may not consider such expenses by parents as debts that they should be obligated to pay back. In some cases, people may consider it their moral obligation to pay back to their parents in the time of need by the parents. In some countries, it is a legal requirement for people to support their old age parents if the latter need financial help.
Happy life – having a good family – supporting family:
     In the above sections, we discussed saving for the future, investing in children’s growth, and paying back the debts that one owes. Now comes, the present life – the middle stage. One likes a good family life once they take up a job, get married, and have a job or run a business. During this stage, one will have income and expenses and hence developing a budget is useful. Actually, a responsible person will consider a budget as a necessity. It is important to realize that a budget depends on the way one plans one’s lifestyle.
     As described in the earlier sections, income, expenses, and choice of lifestyle depend on the upbringing during childhood and the abilities gained during adulthood. Unfortunately, some people become addicted to the past lifestyle (e.g. children of rich parents) rather than reassess the lifestyle they can actually afford based on their own income, which itself is dictated by their capabilities. It is important to recognize that lifestyle determines the expenses. If income is greater than expenses plus forecasted savings for the future, that lifestyle is appropriate. On the other hand, when expenses are greater than the income, one gets into debt, assuming that some other source will lend funds. Such a situation will have bad consequences for later stages of life. Expecting miracles to happen and angels to deliver riches should be left to the dreams!
Paying back to society – paying taxes and charity:
     Most societies assist people who are driven to poverty. In that sense, the society acts as a shock absorber that gives funds to the dispossessed. Usually, such funds are barely sufficient to lead a minimal survival level existence and not a lavish lifestyle. In order to provide such assistance to poor people, the society collects taxes and runs charities. Consequently, people living in societies will be required to pay taxes and may be expected to support charities.
    Despite all the capabilities and strengths, people can run into rough times when their income is drastically disrupted for a variety of reasons including long term ill health or the death of an earning member of the family. Insurance schemes of various types are made available to assist people to overcome such situations and lead a reasonable (planned) lifestyle. To take advantage of such schemes, one has to opt in and pay insurance premiums while they are earning income.
    The idea is that people will have good times and bad times and by pooling their resources in some planned ways, those who are endowed with resources can help those deprived at the times of the latter’s need.
Good next life or next destination – good deeds in this life and religious activities:
     Some people believe that when their life on earth ends, they will be reborn in another life or that they go to heaven or hell. It is here that religions come in and make suggestions about the necessity to do good deeds in this life to either find a better next life or to book a prepaid ticket to heaven rather than be dropped into the hell. Of course, these deeds cost money and/or time.

Prioritization in the Allocation of Time to Accomplish Goals:
     In the previous sections, I listed various types of tasks that one has to do during each stage of their life. As tasks take the time available in a day, in a week, and a year. In this section, I will discuss prioritized allocation of time.
     Children are not able to earn the resources needed but their time is being expended. In other words, neither the choice of goals nor conscious allocation of time to accomplish the selected goals is within their current capability. It is done by the parents, teachers, and the society. Hence, it falls upon parents to allocate a part of their time to ensure that the activities necessary for the proper growth of the children are performed. As a mark of their love for children, parents should take responsibility to do prioritized allocation of time to the growth of children’s physical, mental, and spiritual growth.
     As children begin to express some independence, that is the best time for parents to teach them the lessons about the primacy of time and the need for prioritizing their time allocation. This exercise may be easier if examples of the activities that some highly successful people had undertaken in their childhood and the benefits they accrued are explained to them in the form of reading exercises or showing videos to the children.
     During adolescence, children are attracted by some activities that appear to be fun and enjoyable. They may be inclined to give undue priority to such activities and allocate time quite unconsciously or unintentionally. Very soon, addicted to such activities, adolescents forsake the ability to do prioritization of time allocation to necessary and useful activities. They move into activities like driftwood in a fast flowing stream of water. Parents, teachers, counselors, and coaches may be able to help the children to get back to becoming conscious of their ability and capability to control the prioritization.
     If they forget the concept of prioritization of allocation of time to tasks, young adults drift into doing whatever comes in their way rather than pursuing activities that are relevant and necessary to achieve the current and future goals. Hence, during this stage of life, youth have to put their tasks together and begin prioritizing them as they allocate time to doing the selected and ranked tasks.
     Once prioritized allocation of time becomes a habit in childhood, people will continue to do that during their youth and adult life and they will utilize time in the best manner. I observed many colleagues who had been very conscious of how they were utilizing their time and were specifically avoiding useless pursuits by minimizing the time periods they were involved in trivial pursuits.

Conclusion:
     Once the habit of recognizing the tasks pertinent to a particular stage of life, ranking them, and prioritizing time allocation to the tasks becomes natural, people will begin to identify and accomplish the goals. Such accomplishment is highly likely to make them feel happy and enjoy the tasks rather than see them as burden. They start visualizing a life’s journey that they actually planned, which in turn leads a highly positive outlook on life.
     During their sunset days, they will be very happy that they accomplished successfully all that they planned and will be looking forward to their ensuing journey.
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[i] The writer is not a specialist in the topical area. This write up is based on his thoughts and opinions. Comments are welcome. He plans to write the development of a Life Plan and details of Tasks for each stage of life at a later time. Obviously, that task is not in his priorities now!

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