Life has no shortage of opportunities it throws our way.
By virtue of having billions of people with varying interests and nearly infinite problems to solve, there will always be something more that we could be doing with our time.
However, many of us struggle with the question of when to take on more versus cut back.
Take on too much commitment and you’ll never have the virtue of being able to savor a slower pace of living. Conversely, pass on every opportunity that comes your way and you’ll end up with an abundance of free time with no meaningful activities to use it on.
Both paths lead to a shallow life — the latter just makes the emptiness more obvious by virtue of how idle minds wander.
The purpose of this article is not to take a dump on people who spend their years pursuing multiple things at once. If your ability to juggle multiple things brings you happiness and aligns with your values then more power to you.
But this isn’t about you.
This is about all the people who get caught in analysis paralysis because they don’t know where the line should be drawn between protecting their time and committing to fulfilling activities. Put simply, they struggle with the question of how to allocate their time.
After reading this article, you should have a better understanding of how to:
- Find the middle ground between income and free time
- Capitalize on opportunities without burning yourself out
- Strike a balance between emptiness and busyness
Be sure to read to the end for a bonus section on how to get more time, attention, and energy.
Let’s get into it!
Table of Contents
Trading Time For Money: Finding a Reasonable Exchange Rate
Past a certain point in your career, you will always have the option to trade more time for more money.
Whether this is an office worker working overtime, a freelancer taking on additional assignments, or a business owner sacrificing weekends in favor of faster revenue growth.
Regardless of which form it takes, we all have the tendency to chase more income or wealth.
“The world is constantly telling you that the path to a better life is more, more, more — buy more, own more, make more, fuck more, be more.” ~Mark Manson
However, it’s hard to discern how much money you need (or might need in the future and therefore should earn now).
There are actionable steps you could take to try to solve this question mathematically.
Ask yourself how much you need to:
- Cover your cost of living (without lifestyle inflation)
- Put away each month to cover your mortgage and/or taxes
- Deposit on your investment account or 401(k) to hit your goals
These quantitative equations are helpful (and should be done) but often fall into the category of “necessary but not sufficient.” The Psychology of Money reminds us that humans are emotionally driven creatures and therefore reasonable is usually better than rational.
“Do not aim to be coldly rational when making financial decisions. Aim to just be pretty reasonable. Reasonable is more realistic and you have a better chance of sticking with it for the long run, which is what matters most when managing money.” ~Morgan Housel
Even if you could stick with a rational strategy, optimizing returns doesn’t maximize happiness.
This is why thinking about your values and the things that bring you joy — hopefully with a decent overlap between the two — should be the next step. Emotional considerations help you validate the financial calculus (living costs, debt/taxes, and investing) you started out with.
When I’m uncertain about whether or not I should trade more time for money, I think of this quote as my guiding light: “To make money they didn’t have and didn’t need, they risked what they did have and did need. That is foolish. That is just plain foolish.” ~Warren Buffett
Most times, it helps me realize that I’m trading the things I have and need (quality time with myself or loved ones) for something that I don’t need (a few extra bucks that will sit in the bank).
Don’t get me wrong, I’m a loyal proponent of the VTI and chill approach to investing — centered around index funds and compound interest — that Vanguard founder Jack Bogle so strongly advocated.
That said, there should be a limit to how much present happiness you’re willing to sacrifice for future wealth.
While it’s true that most people have the opposite problem (constantly choosing instant gratification over long-term security), the inverse can be equally damaging if you spend your entire youth trying to squeeze out a few extra percentage points for your retirement fund.
The key, as always, is finding the balance that works for you.
Much like having too much disposable income in the present, an excess of wealth in the future could lead you to realize that the happiness you never had would have been more valuable than the money you’ll never spend.
Ultimately, deciding how much time to trade for money is kind of like comparing money changers when you need to exchange fiat currency. You want to compare a couple of locations to get a reasonable exchange rate but avoid driving to the next town for marginally higher rates.
Commitment Caps: Excellence in Moderation
It’s important to realize that you have control over not just how many commitments you take but also how much time, energy, and attention you devote to each one.
The failure to realize this leads many people (myself included) into a black-and-white way of thinking about commitments.
In other words, they believe they only have two options:
- Pass on the opportunity completely
- Commit fully and give it 110%
This is likely because people don’t like the idea of half-assing something — and I’m not saying you should.
But, ironically, spreading yourself too thin will make you more likely to start half-assing commitments purely because you don’t have the bandwidth to give everything your all.
Either you’re physically exhausted/mentally drained or there just aren’t enough hours in a day.
I’ll say that again: you DON’T have the bandwidth to give EVERYTHING your ALL.
And you never will. No one can.
Choosing everything (and giving everything to everything) is, in reality, choosing nothing.
“To value something, we must reject what is not that something. To value X, we must reject non-X.” ~Mark Manson
Therefore capping the resources you spend — whether it’s time, attention, and/or energy — is not about being “lackadaisical” (thanks, Google!) but rather leaving enough in the tank to ensure you’re in a position and condition to give life your best.
In short, moderation helps you excel at the things you do choose to pursue — even if that means not spending as much time on each individual commitment.
What does this look like in practice?
It could be:
- Joining organizations you believe in BUT only devoting a specific day (or amount of time) to them each week.
- Pursuing a career path that you’re passionate about BUT leaving work at the office and not answering emails at home.
- Getting a new hobby BUT only spending your energy on it after you’ve completed the more important tasks of the day.
Time, attention, and energy are the ingredients for productivity that Chris Bailey outlines in The Productivity Project. However, I’d argue that they’re also the resources for achieving happiness and should thus be spent wisely.
“Productivity isn’t about doing more things — it’s about doing the right things.” ~Chris Bailey
Bonus Section: Generating More Resources
[If you’re not interested in increasing the amount of time, attention, and energy available to you then scroll down to the conclusion.]
Much like saving more and spending less are two sides of the same coin, so too are committing resources and freeing up resources.
But while spending less to save more is a straightforward concept to grasp, how does one generate more time, attention, and energy?
Well, let’s start with the first two by identifying the culprit behind our chronic shortage.
I’m, of course, talking about the ubiquitous smartphone present in the pockets of billions of people around the world.
Just how widespread are these distraction generators?
Well, there are over three billion smartphone users in the top 20 countries alone:
In fact, 85% of Americans own a smartphone (compared to 35% back in 2011) according to data from the Pew Research Center. That comes out to almost 300 million smartphone users just from the United States.
Perhaps more concerning is the fact that two hours per day spent on your phone amounts to 30 full days annually.
That’s a month out of every year of your life.
Do the math: 2 (hours per day) x 365 (days per year) / 24 (hours per day) = 30 (days annually)
The worst part is that the global average for smartphone usage is actually five hours per day — which is equivalent to two and a half months per year.
Spending less time on your smartphone — and the social media, video streaming, or email apps installed on it — will free up a couple of hours per day while increasing your ability to focus on meaningful tasks.
Tip: Watch this podcast episode with Cal Newport to learn more about digital minimalism.
That takes care of both time and attention but what about energy?
Aside from the usual (but essential) tenets of eating healthier and going to the gym two to three times a week, there are some neuroscience-backed protocols (gleaned from Stanford Professor Andrew Huberman’s podcast) that you can deploy to boost energy levels as well:
- Sunlight. Viewing sunlight within the first hour of waking (the sooner the better) for even just a few minutes will shift your daily cortisol release to earlier in the day. This helps you focus throughout the day and sleep better at night (boosting your energy tomorrow).
- Cold. Epinephrine’s job is to make more energy available to your brain and body. One of the easiest ways to increase epinephrine (and dopamine) is to take a cold shower at a temperature that’s uncomfortable but safe.
- Pleasure. Overstimulating the pleasure centers in your brain can deplete the amount of dopamine in your brain’s synaptic vesicles. Epinephrine is made from dopamine which means that using up all your dopamine reserves will reduce your energy capacity.
While elevated epinephrine and dopamine can increase your energy/motivation, one should be careful with how they get that boost.
Chronic stress will elevate your epinephrine but undermine its benefits by reducing your energy, motivation, focus, and memory — not to mention putting you at risk of a wide range of cardiovascular diseases.
Similarly, cocaine is extremely effective at spiking dopamine but then levels crash shortly after.
It’s also illegal.
Finding safe and healthy ways to leverage catecholamines like epinephrine and dopamine can leave you with more energy to allocate to your commitments. That said, you should always build these protocols upon a strong foundation of sleep, nutrition, and exercise.
Conclusion
I’m not a multi-tasker. I never have been. In fact, the tendency to focus on one thing at a time and give it my all has been one of the integral drivers of my success.
But that comes with an outsized fear of spreading myself too thin.
Knowing that I’m most productive when doing less biases me against taking on new commitments. This is great for amassing wealth and time — worthwhile resources, to be sure — but can also lead to missed opportunities for meaningful activities with people I value.
Staying aware, questioning your beliefs, and achieving balance through moderation are a few ways to counteract this overprotectiveness for free time.
Funnily enough, those struggling with the opposite issue (a tendency to take on too much) can use the same principles of awareness, self-questioning, and moderation to find their balance.
Note: All the links in this article were chosen carefully to provide the most helpful resources on the topic. I’d highly recommend reading through a few of them when you have the time as it will help you get a deeper understanding of the advice presented today.
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