Four Thousand Weeks

"Four Thousand Weeks:

Time Management for 

Mortals" is a popular book 

by Oliver Burkeman

4,000 weeks. That’s about the average life span. 4,000 weeks will put you at almost 77 years old. If it’s accurate I only have 1,150 weeks left! That doesn’t sound like very much time “to get everything done.” Or so I thought... 

I regularly meet with a group in Sidney each Wednesday for a discussion called "Coffee with Champions". Our topic is different every meeting and several months ago, one particular meeting, the topic was 4,000 weeks. We discussed just how valuable and limited our time truly is. We talked about choices, priorities, and relationships. Our work lives occupy a lot of those 4,000 weeks, so I chose to focus on my personal life here are some takeaways I found useful for me.

• A full schedule doesn’t equal a full life
• Choose activities that light you up, not ones that simply fill your calendar
• You don’t need more hours, you need more awareness
• Focusing on fewer things makes each one more impactful
• When you slow down, you notice what actually deserves your attention
• Your best moments happen when you’re fully in them, not rushing past them
• Productivity isn’t about doing more, it’s about being fully engaged in what you’re doing

How do I make that work for me? Recently, I traveled to Indianapolis with my wife for a concert. After reviewing those takeaways above, here are my BLUNDERS and BRIGHT SPOTS with how I handled one of my 4,000 weeks.

BLUNDER: Doing house chores in the morning before we departed. The chores could have waited. I now realize I was distracted with believing I was being productive. In reality, I was instead disengaged from the purpose of the day.

BLUNDER & BRIGHT SPOT: I considered scheduling additional activities for the afternoon. Fortunately I didn’t and we decided to simply walk the city. By focusing on fewer things, it made the concert much more impactful.

BRIGHT SPOT: We visited friends. My wife discovered friends were on the other side of downtown. Instead of making excuses about a mile-long walk, one of our best moments was seeing them for 45 minutes.

What did I learn? When we quit trying to cram more tasks into our day, we discover a better way to live! 

-Craig

One of our 4,000 weeks and it was a good one!