REFLECTIONS ON TIME
Field workers in the Religious Society of Friends have somewhat high expectations of themselves and others. Hopefully our high hopes grow out of our faith to be in and move from that Living Spirit among us rather than the high hopes growing out of a crisis of faith in which life should be holy and good so we get up every morning to do the good works that "earn" our value and "save" a dying world. In a crisis of faith, no degree of orderliness will keep us from burning out. Turn inward. Moving from a place of faith and degrees of orderliness in our daily lives release us to do the work we are called to with serenity, freshness, and openness. God never asks more of us than we are able. If I am exhausted, I must ask, "Whose work am I doing?"
Time counted on the clock may be organized, but it's a minor measure in our experience of time. Time is fuller or emptier, longer or shorter, richer or poorer depending on the state in which we live it. All ministers must challenge themselves to live in the fullness of faithfulness-to test and rededicate continuously.
Whenever my grandfather heard one of us say, "I just didn't have enough time," he would reply, "Time? All you have is time! You mean you didn't take the time?!" We each have a few God-given gifts: environment, time, talent, and health. These things are precious and should be used with care. That is the spirit in which the tools below are offered. Being conscious and conscientious about my use and commitments of time opens the opportunity to reflect on my faith, on what God wants of me really, and on how to develop integrity. Producing an orderly, outward record of how my time is spent also allows me to share it with other Friends or with an oversight or clearness committee to seek spiritual discernment and accountability in the use of my time together with others.
Time is infinite and time is bounded. The boundaries of time are a great gift. We must reflect, make priorities, simplify, cut, and focus to reap the greatest fruits of our time-fruits that may be much greater than the time we put in. It's the interplay between the fullness and the limitation that makes time such a creative force. It is like a guitar string pulled between greatness and limitedness to just the right balance that creates the beautiful notes of music.
TIME: BUDGET AND EXPENSE REPORTS
One day I sat down, exhausted, and thought, "How could I be doing so well and yet feel like I must quit because I just can't keep up with it?" Everyone loved the work I was doing, but I was running ragged. I was going to lose it. So I sat and wrote down all the things I'd promised everyone I would do and approximately how long it would take and in what period of time it had to be done. I'd promised myself 250%! After that, I began the following system that has been very important to my being able to work independently, effectively, and not burn out.
Annual Time Budget: I make an annual budget exactly like a financial budget. It has line items like: mail, YM gathering, Half YM gathering, Rep Meeting and Executive Committee, newsletter support, youth program support, directory, finances, meeting visitation, Field Secretary's Gathering, publications support, contingency, and so forth. For each line item I put in approximately how many hours I plan to spend on each of these. A full-time year has 1,800 working hours (see calculation below). Just like a financial budget, when you start you have to make the best educated, calculated guess you can, after which experience kicks in and you adjust to experience and planning.
Daily Time Budget: I get a small MONTH-AT-A-GLANCE planning calendar. For everything I plan to do, I estimate how much time I need to do it and I write IN PENCIL on the calendar "appointments" to do the work; not just meetings with other people, but also meetings with myself at my desk. Therefore, the sit-at-the-desk-and-get-it-done work is as apparent on the calendar as the scheduled appointments with other people. If I agree to meet someone at a given time that has work scheduled into it, I have to move that work somewhere else. Finding a time for it is sometimes harder than I think, so I'm immediately cued that I really don't have time, even for this small thing, given all the other things I've promised. The longer I do this, the better I get at estimating the number of hours it takes to do something.
I count the days in each month I plan to work and multiply by eight. In the upper right-hand corner I write the number of working hours in that month, subtracting out the already planned hours, so that at a glance I can see how many hours I have available for new promises. When someone asks, can you do such-and-such in next month, we talk about how many hours it'll take and look. If I agree, I write the number of hours I expect to spend that month on that thing and subtract it out.
Daily Time Expense Report: I keep a second WEEK-AT-A-GLANCE calendar to write down how I actually spent my time each day. For periods in my life I have written down all 24 hours a day to see how many hours I was actually sleeping, cooking, eating, bathing, playing with the kids, and so forth. For other periods in my life I have just written down what I've done in the working hours. I try to schedule something physical, social, mental, spiritual, and aesthetic each week.
Monthly and Annual Time Expense Report: At the end of each month, I write down how much time was spent on each line item. This is done up against the budget for twelve months and then the total. This shows exactly where the time went. It is only from looking at this view that I have gotten better at estimating the actual time needed for specific tasks and that I have any idea how much time I'm spending on what.
BALANCE IN WORKING HOURS
The 1,800 working hours is calculated from counting five days per week for every week of the year. There are about 260 working days in one year or 2,080 hours counting eight hours a day for each of those days, then deducting 88 hours for the 11 national recognized holidays; 96 hours for 12 vacation days; and 96 hours for 12 sick, mental health, or otherwise unproductive days. This leaves 1,800 working hours in the year, or about 150-180 hours per month.
This calculation is a traditional, standard, full-time job. I am the sole support and primary care giver for two children. When the kids were in elementary school, I found that if I routinely worked 35 hours a week, I felt like I hardly worked. I felt I had a lot of time with the kids and I always felt fresh, energetic and rested. If I worked 40-45 hours per week, I kept on top of things, but always felt slightly stretched, cranky at times, and crashed at night. If I worked more than 45 hours, it doesn't seem to matter how many hours I worked-50, 80, 110-I have spent long periods working L-O-N-G hours. This is probably very different with different family compositions and stresses, personal constitutions and health, and times and stages in life. Deciding what basic routine pattern you want changes the calculation above.
I am continually amazed at the fact that I have a tendency to obligate just above the level in which I stay fresh and alive. When 35 hours a week would keep me fresh, I work just over 40; when 45 would do it I work 50. Not a lot over, but just enough over that I'm pushing (myself and others). I wonder why this is. It is clearly not God's desire for me. I remember the words of the hymn, "Take from our souls the strain and stress; and let our ordered lives confess, the beauty of thy peace." I'm addicted to the strain and stress. It's a hard addiction to give up; but a necessary one for a Friend.
When one can find that level of working that is refreshing, keep the obligations within that level. This restricts the obligations one can make. It requires reflection on what to say yes to and what to say no to. The easy way out is to say yes to everything we can and no when life is totally impossible or we're sick. In this we are just abdicating responsibility for discernment on what is really important for us to be doing and what are good works that are not ours to be doing. This activity requires that we witness to others in saying no to good works that are not called for. This is a difficult step in integrity.
This discipline pushes us to be discerning about what we promise to do and ensures we have a scheduled time to do it. I have heard long-time Friends whom I respect greatly express concern that Friends are losing our reputation for integrity-the centerpiece of our Society. We need to be limited and discerning in what we choose to do and then truly DO IT and do it well.
Finally, this discipline limits what we plan and obligate ourselves to, which leaves time and energy for things that just come up. We are available to God in the long-term commitments of our lives, but also available to God in the day-to-day opportunities and needs that arise. We are available in a fresh way with a glad heart, not in an oh,-I-have-to-but-God-I'm-so-tired way.
All this hinges on physically:
• budgeting time annually and monthly
• tracking of how time is spend daily and monthly
• summarizing time budgeted and spent monthly and annual basis
• praying for discernment daily and weekly
• asking other Friends for testing one's discernment monthly & quarterly
• showing other Friends for simple accountability monthly & quarterly (we tend not to do this if we're not showing someone else monthly)
This should be a familiar process. It is the same as we do with our financial budgets and expenses. I like doing them, both time and money, in the same spirit. God gives us environment, time, talent, and health. We trade these things for money. Therefore, money is just a proxy for the gifts of God and should be treated as sacred, with the reverence, integrity, and compassion that gifts of God deserve. Our time is the same. Our time is not ours, it is a gift of God, one contribution that goes into the glory of God, Heaven on Earth. Our use of time should be done with care.
These articles are from Resources
for Fostering Vital Friends Meetings
See also: the FGC Quaker Library
