Comments on: Time-tracking: A manifesto

By: Donna

Donna — Sun, 16 Jan 2022 17:12:40 +0000

I missed tracking last week because the emails ended up in my junk mail (duh!) but I’m going to do it this week. I love your references to music in your life because it is such an important part of mine. “O God, Our Help in Ages Past” was a favourite of mine as a kid but I wasn’t very aware of the words. I found the music so very powerful. It’s not one that I have sung as an adult, since I am a UU choir director, but I will go back and look at the words. Thank you for that!

By: Caroline Starr Rose

Caroline Starr Rose — Tue, 23 Nov 2021 16:00:03 +0000

The line in that hymn has always reminded me of Thoreau: “Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it; but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains. I would drink deeper; fish in the sky, whose bottom is pebbly with stars.”

By: Diane C.

Diane C. — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 23:40:04 +0000

I came across this article the other day, about how the week as a unit of time is sort of messy and unnatural, but it’s how we’ve come to anchor the rhythm of our lives. I thought it was an interesting article because I find that Wednesday is always the day that makes me feel like the week has gone by in a blink because my nine year old has piano lessons on 7am on Wednesday mornings and every Wednesday morning it feels like, “Oh wow, here we are again! How did we get here again so soon?!?” But then I look at my time log and realize that, oh right there has indeed been things happening between Wednesdays and the log helps me remember what they all were. I feel like I’m pretty good at living in the moment, but I’m not great at remembering what those moments are.

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/11/weeks-seven-days-david-henkin/620712/

By: Laura Vanderkam

Laura Vanderkam — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 14:16:06 +0000

In reply to Sally.

@Sally – I have found it helpful to think of time this way – a canvas, a mosaic, whatever you want to call it. There is a certain amount of temporal space. I have 168 hours in a week. In general, I am going to be awake for 16.6 hours/day. Knowing those dimensions, I can think about what should go in there, what shouldn’t go in there, and so forth.

By: Laura Vanderkam

Laura Vanderkam — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 14:14:25 +0000

In reply to Emily. @Emily - Isaac Watts has some good ones!

By: Laura Vanderkam

Laura Vanderkam — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 14:13:54 +0000

In reply to Katherine B.

@Katherine B – this was one of the most fascinating things I discovered with time tracking too. My happy spot is 7.3-7.4 hours. If I am getting that consistently I start waking up on my own before the alarm clock. I still get that amount when life is out of whack but I’m getting far less some nights and more some other nights and that disorderly sleep makes it hard to function. I can’t always control this (see: toddler) but when I can it’s great.

By: Emily

Emily — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 09:43:03 +0000

“O God, Our Help in Ages Past” is one of my favorite hymns as well, especially the verse you cite above. A good reminder to be wise stewards of our time!

By: Sally

Sally — Thu, 18 Nov 2021 03:17:50 +0000

“Knowing the size and shape of the canvas, I could experiment more, and make something even more satisfying.” What a wonderful image! And a really helpful way to think of the dimensions and shape of our time. (And yes to the power of Isaac Watts’ poetry! Thanks especially for the reminder of that particular verse, too.)

By: Katherine B

Katherine B — Wed, 17 Nov 2021 20:45:15 +0000

I have tried tracking my time a few times and found it interesting but a bit too time consuming. But back at the end of May I bought myself a Fitbit and one of the things it does is track sleep. I would have told you I needed the traditional 8 hours a night and that I often got this. But according to the tracker the highest average week since May was 7 hours 35 minutes and that was a holiday week. Most weeks the average is well under 7 hours and I honestly haven’t felt tired or sleep deprived at all. So I have been telling myself for years that I both need and get 8 hours a night plus and it just isn’t and wasn’t true at all. The power of real time data!