Somewhere along the way, I heard (or at least recall as having heard) that words are both creative and generative. It is a notion I have repeated hundreds of times in coaching. Today I am reflecting on it again after hearing from a client that she and her husband met regarding a shared concern, and subsequently agreed to take time in the future to continue working toward a solution. This idea of taking time confounds me. Word choice, particularly as pertains to time, often takes on this magical, supernatural, fantastical connotation.
Consider it. In terms of time (a measure), what can you really do?
And how about taking time? (like my client and her husband) From where (or whom) does one take time? From one’s own busy calendar? Or maybe we steal time from others. How about taking time from the kid next door? You know, the one who plays video games half the day and all night? Seriously, he seems to be wasting time on a frivolous pursuit. Perhaps you can just reach into his time bank and take some of it. Heck, he’ll probably never even notice.
Or maybe you can make time. Any one of us has hooked into this illusion. I’ll make time to practice Italian (my current fantasy), play the piano, clean out the closet, exercise, shop for healthy food . . . you get the idea. This power says we can create the extra minutes so many of us crave. Everything gets done when we can make time (except maybe sleep). As creators of time we are absolutely omnipotent (and of course wholly delusional).
Deconstructed in this way, vacuous language in the treatment of time is (painfully, obviously) absurd. “Of course,” you may be thinking, “I know I can’t actually find, take or make time. It’s just a figure of speech.” But is it really? Because if there is nothing real about finding, taking or making time, what do our words really mean? What action are they creating? What motivation are they generating to take that action?
Let’s consider again my client and her husband. By agreeing to a time and date at which they will continue their discussion they suddenly have a mandate and direction. They agree that instead of feeling under the gun by agreeing to an executable approach, they experience instead a certain grounded focus. They’ve initiated a chain of actions that include considering their future schedules, identifying an opening on both calendars when their time is not otherwise obligated and committing to spending that time together working on their solution.
With this point in the future identified, my client and her husband find they independently are considering the requests and concessions required for a mutually agreeable solution. And because time is, in fact, bounded by seconds, minutes, hours and days, their focus is sharpened within the real parameters of the measure of time. Now they have action and are generating energy toward a desired outcome.
It’s not always easy. I won’t begin to suggest to you that I don’t get push back from clients when I question time fantasies. I often hear: “It’s too hard to plan . . . My time is really never my own . . . My calendar is so unpredictable. “ I get it. And I remind them of the well-known management adage: what gets measured gets done. Time, no matter what hocus-pocus we desire, is quantifiable and measurable. So while we might find keys, take a coat from its hanger or make cookies, when it comes to word choice and time what we’ve really got is measurement and allocation.
So today, I am scheduling my time to practice Italian from 1:00 to 1:30 each weekday afternoon (gosh, I just felt the resistance – and I’m going for it anyway!). Because if I want to order a meal or find a toilet in Italy come June, I’ve got to have more than a little magic in my pocket. I need to create and generate the action within the time available between now and then– Lei capisce?
Now how about you? What’s lingering out there in your world of time fantasy that can get real when you schedule and commit to action?
If not now, when?
