I still remember sitting in a large lecture hall during my freshman year of college at the University of Oregon for an intro to economics course. As he began his lecture, the professor calmly stated, “Whatever you’re doing at any given moment, is exactly what you want to be doing...Do you agree?” After a pause, a student took the bait and boldly chimed in by saying; “Well actually I’d rather be skiing right now than in this class.” The professor then responded by saying; “That’s what you think, but if the benefits of skiing outweighed the consequences of missing this class, then you wouldn’t be here right now.” It was a perfect lesson in cost-benefit analysis and I was hooked by this idea that most of what we chose to do is based on the balance of minimizing pain in comparison to maximizing joy.

Life is much more complex than the choice to ski or go to class, but outside of being physically restrained, everyday we are faced with thousands of choices on how to spend our time. Do we stay at work for an extra hour to get a project done, or do we we opt for happy hour drinks with friends? Do we schedule a breakfast meeting with a potential client, or make time to have breakfast with our kids? Do we agree to join the board of an organization that aligns with our values or do we choose to leave more space for the people we work with? These choices aren’t right or wrong and each provide their own set of benefits and drawbacks.

We all have 24 hours in each day. We have time for whatever we want to do, what we make time for is a different story. After my economics lesson, I was inspired to be accountable for how I spent my time. Not just to myself, but to the other people in my life. I realized that I was guilty of overusing the phrase; “I’m sorry I didn’t have time to….” I would say to my friends, “I didn’t have time to call you back” or “I didn’t have time to run that errand for you.” I would justify my own work by telling myself that it was ok because “I didn’t have time to get that project done” or “I didn’t have time to do an extra hour of studying for a test”. I realized that if I replaced “have” with “make” it would force me to be more critical about the choices I made. It’s not easy to say to someone “I’m sorry, I didn’t make time for you.” But knowing I would have to say that, forced me to decide if it was really important to me, or if I was doing so because I felt obligated. Yes, there is some brutal honesty here, but I think most people appreciate the truth as opposed to fluff and patronization.

Leaders have an insane amount of demands on their time. I’ve found that the best ones, take back control of that time and are intentional about how they spend it, knowing what the true benefits and consequences are of those choices. I challenge you to think about where you are spending time that is not serving you. Where are you making false assumptions about the costs associated with those choices? Is that really where you want to be spending your time? Or are you doing so out of obligation? And are you willing to own those choices and instead of taking the easy way out by saying you didn’t “have” time, are you willing to say; “I’m sorry, I didn’t make time”?