168

 I have a cute story about time management that I learned at my daughter's college orientation.  In summer of 2006 we traveled to Washington DC for my daughter's 2 1/2 day freshman orientation at GWU.  The first day late morning session we enter the auditorium and there is a flip chart with the number 168 written on it, the only thing on the stage.  It was a prop for the Dean of Students' talk with students and parents.  So he comes out asking us what the number represented and there was all kinds of answers; he told us that everyone had it and even Oprah.  I guess in 2006 no one knew what he was talking about and I am wondering if many people know about it now.  Anyway this goes on for about 5 or 10 minutes but no one in the audience guessed.  Then he stated that this is the number of hours everyone had in a week.  Yep, we all have 168 hours a week, 24x7.  Then he breaks down the numbers and I start writing on my piece of paper also and when he was done the students still had about 52 hours left to do whatever; classes, sleep, studying and a few other things were covered. I found this fascinating because if we break down the hours in a day, it doesn't seem like we have any time left.  I learned a lot from this session and I had taken a few time management classes just for me as a young wife and mother and it helped tremendously but this was 15 years later and I learned something new.
I know a lot of people who really don't want to hear this but it's true and I think every one should seriously look at how they are spending their time.  My one day that I don't worry about time is Sunday, unless I am working on a project.  So even on Saturday, because I kept running out of time on Saturdays and it was getting frustrating to me, I manage my time.  I get up very early to get my runs in usually somewhere between 3-10 miles or more if a race is close.  I also try real hard to get 7 hours of sleep a night.
I really feel sad when I hear a person is overwhelmed and do not have time for themselves.  I am sure everyone does the best they can but we can all do just a little bit more with figuring out our 168.