Your house.
The end… thanks for reading!
Just joking! 🙃
So what is it?
Here’s a riddle with the answer:
I am free yet priceless. You can't own me but you can use me. You can't keep me but you can spend me. Once you lose me, you can never have me back. What am I?
Time.
What do we trade our time for?
Ask any elderly person and they will all tell you the same thing: “time flies" or “don't blink" or “where did the time go?”
To someone younger, the concept and importance of their use of time is often lost on them, simply because they have no reason to feel they’re in any shortage of it.
However, as we grow older, the unstoppable force of time becomes more real to us.
Many turn to books about time management that help to develop habits, implement methodologies or even give a new perspective on the reality of time. All great things of course.
But perhaps what’s more impactful are the testimonials. Those who’ve experienced the weight of their decisions and the returns on their invested time.
For example:
The Business Man
There once was a business man who worked for one of the largest companies in the world. He wasn't a C-suite executive but he also wasn’t at the bottom of the ladder either. He was somewhere in the upper middle.
The man put in 80-100 hour work weeks for the large part of his career. In doing so, with his dedication and effort, he pulled in an immense amount of money for his wife and 3 kids… who he didn't see very often.
His life was largely spent solving problems, running projects, and making money for this corporation. And he did it well.
In doing so he missed his kids’ concerts, baseball games, soccer games, awards ceremonies and sometimes even birthdays.
From Australia to Germany, he met many faces and shook many hands, moving up the corporate ladder. He thought he was setting up his family for life long stability, while also providing for what he thought were their most important needs.
In his mind he provided food, clothing, shelter, allowances, a big home, cars and put his kids through private school and university.
However, when they graduated, one by one, they flew their own way, all apart from one another and apart from him, ending up in different countries… where they got married, had grandkids and lived far, far away from the home he'd thought he built.
It wasn't until this moment, at the tail end of his career, did this man realize the full effect of how he invested his time and the things he didn’t provide by being absent.
What he thought was a gain, in part, turned out to be a cost. When his kids had desired him, he was absent, and now, when he desires them, they're gone. They barely knew him and he barely knew them.
His stomach churned as he digested the sobering reality that time is non-fungible. Irreversible.
The transaction was settled.
So in all his efforts to reconcile and “make up for the lost time”, there was little effect. The damage had been done and the walls built. Though his bank account and retirement accounts were full, his heart was empty and broken.
Now, among his colleagues he was one of the most successful by worldy means. And they’d ask him “Tell us, what was the best investment you ever made?”
And he’d reply “I don’t know… but let me tell you my worst.”
Don't be like the business man. While this man was consumed with his career, we too get consumed with things… mostly at the alter of ourselves.
The saying:
“You don’t know what you have until it’s gone"
Couldn't be more true for the concept of time.
Our time is more than just a commodity for sale, it's our life’s currency and it's scarce.
So What Can We Do?
Consider these things:
James 4:14
“Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.”
Life is brief. We're born one day and gone the next. This truth keeps things in perspective on how we spend our time; from the words we say, the things we do and the thoughts we think - there are implications.
Mind the words of Christ:
Matthew 6:19-21
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Jesus’s statements here cause some introspection: What are the treasures we’re working towards? Earthly ones or heavenly? Where do our hearts truly lie?
Ultimately, Jesus is not saying don’t work to make a living or do anything to make life better… the call to action is for obedience to our God and Father with all our heart, mind, soul and strength. It's a check on our inner most intentions. Are we set on Him, doing all things unto the Lord (Colossians 3:23) or are we set on ourselves?
Take a Moment
Take pause to analyze, assess and adjust regularly.
Between work, family, friends, groups and all the other stuff we do - it's always a good practice to be mindful of how we are investing our greatest asset in light of the words of Jesus.