Lean Quote: Lost Time is Never Found Again

On Fridays I will post a Lean related Quote. Throughout our lifetimes many people touch our lives and leave us with words of wisdom. These can both be a source of new learning and also a point to pause and reflect upon lessons we have learned. Within Lean active learning is an important aspect on this journey because without learning we can not improve.

"Lost time is never found again." — Benjamin Franklin

Every time we put something off, the excuse is some variation of the same: "I'll get to it later. I won't be long. I've got plenty of time." Once that moment is gone, though, it's gone forever.

While it may be tempting to think that it's okay to put something off, the truth is you'll never get those minutes back. You can allocate future time to doing tasks you could do now, but that's essentially spending on credit.

Consider these 7 golden rules of time management for effective management of our most valuable commodity.

1. Time is fleeting. Think about it...the moment you started reading this is gone, never to be regained. It seems we get so caught up in petty circumstances that we forget what we set out to do, and before you know it, the day is gone!

2. Time is valuable. You always have time to make money; but you can never have enough money to make time!

3. Time is unforgiving. The amazing thing about your time; even through no fault of your own, even "wasted" time will never stand still.

4. Time is money. You must be constantly asking yourself, "Am I doing the most productive thing I can be doing right now?" Watch out for those "wasted" moments we were talking about earlier.

5. Time is always changing. We all must constantly renew our minds, and let the past be just that...the past! It can't help you now, aside from the learning experience, don't dwell on it.

6. Time is the ultimate judge. We have all heard "time will tell!" Well, there is some truth to that, as the future has a way of finding any flaw in the plan. Pre-planning will save massive amounts of your precious commodity called time.

7. Time is in your control. We can all be more in control of our day and how we spend it. Today should have been planned out yesterday, and tomorrow should be thought about today.

Time can't be saved.  It can only be spent! We spend it at the exact rate of one minute per minute. We can’t spend more or less no matter how hard we try. We can’t spend more than 5 minutes in five minutes with a friend, and we can’t spend less than 5 minutes in five minutes being angry in traffic. Our rate of spending is fixed. All we can control is where we choose to invest…