Proper Time Management is About Learning How to Drive

If you want better results and you want to gain back control of your time, increase your productivity, reduce your stress, you are going to have to learn how to drive.

This concept, learning how to drive is a mainstay of what I teach people about time, productivity, stress, business skills, it's all rolled into one. It's about deciding if you are going to be a passenger, let other people decide things for you, or are you going to be a driver and take the decision making process into your own hands.

Passengers

What do you think of when you hear the word passengers? Does it have a positive, aggressive, take charge connotation to it, of course not? You do not even have to know where I was going with that one to know it was not going to end up well for the passengers. Unfortunately, 95 %, perhaps even higher than that, is the percentage of the people who are reading this, will fall into the category of passengers, passengers of life.

Nothing gets the hair up on people quicker than to put them into that category of passengers, but the reality is , that is where most of us belong. The good news is , it does not take much to get out of the back seat and into the drivers seat. Let's first quickly identify what separates a passenger from a driver:

• passengers do not have an organized systematic way of identifying their agenda
• passengers do not a written agenda for their daily schedules to follow
• passengers do not have a way of keeping track of their goals and dreams in life
• passengers allow other people to put their agenda in play
• passengers allow other people to dictate the course of events for them
• passengers let other people make their decisions for them

The list is much longer than this one but you can clearly see the direction that I am going in. First, I introduced a word into the mix that may need a little explaining, Agenda, what is it. ? I use Agenda as a multi purpose word but the main definition that I use is this; the course of action that will most benefit you and further your pursuit of your goals.

To be honest, I have a host of definitions but that one works well for here. Your Agenda is your best friend, it will help you get successful, will help you stay organized, will make you toe the line you have set for yourself, it is really a dynamic tool that you need to get and develop. Remember this about passengers and Agendas. Passengers are not drivers because they do not have Agendas that is what separates drivers from passengers.

Drivers

I have already set this one up for us. Drivers are everything that passengers are not. Drivers have everything passengers do not. One thing that I have not discussed about drivers and passengers is this. Drivers take charge, they are pro-active and they are aggressive in putting forth their Agenda. Passengers sit back, do not take the initiative and because they do not have an Agenda, are incapable of driving something they do not posses.

One final note, the real difference between passengers and drivers is the attitude, or better yet, the lack of one. Drivers create an attitude about their Agendas and this enables them to get the things they want, and need to get done, done. They create an edge to their attitude about their time, and this puts them into a position to become successful. Passengers lack this edge, this attitude and they just allow themselves to be pushed into the background and they end up watching instead of participating

As the title says, you have to learn to drive your own Agenda and this will put you in the drivers seat and in a position to make things happen for yourself.