It's that time of the year when I review my personal time keeping metrics showing how I've spent my time over the previous year. I've been doing this exercise diligently since 2015, when I created a framework for myself called "RAGE" Reality, Aspirations, Goals, Expectations. Using ideas from software engineering and product management, I decided to map out my personal (life) and professional (work) streams across the many dimensions I was involved in (Muslim | Individual | Professional | Husband | Father | Friend | etc.). I focused on Time as the key metric to track, since time is one of the most important resource that should never be squandered.
The idea is simple: if something is important to me, then I should be spending time in that area - but if I end up spending little or zero time on that thing, then that thing must have not been as important to me as I thought it was.
Tracking time allows me to answer questions like:
- Am I spending time in the areas that are important to me?
- Which areas am I over indexing on that negatively impacts my other steams, robbing me of value?
- Am I giving each stream the necessary amount of attention?
- What decisions do I need to make when the data and anecdotes (feelings / instincts) don't match up?