Essay 04

The Time Value Relationship

On productivity culture, loved ones, and the math nobody does.

Whenever I watch content online or look up videos to motivate myself, the biggest thing people talk about is time.

Be productive with your time. Manage your time. Meet the right people in the time you have. Make sure your time is making you money. Time is everything.

I'm aligned with that. I get it. Time is finite and how you spend it matters.

But in this whole time-value-money relationship that keeps going on and on and on, there are some days when I sit back and think about something else entirely.

The time I have left on this planet. The time my parents have. My sister. My mother. My dog, who is turning six this year.

I hope she grows up to be a very, very old doggie.

But the truth is — all of us have very limited time. And in the race to be productive, to optimise, to grind — we forget that the people who suffer the most when we give all our time to our success are the people who love us.

· · ·

This thought came into my head on a very random day.

I realised I was spending 12 to 13 hours of my waking hours on work. In the remaining hours, I was so exhausted and tired that I could barely function.

For what?

Is it because it will make me money?

Money for what? If that money is only going to be spent on my bills later — because I am burnt out and tired — then what was the point?

· · ·

The productivity internet will tell you to optimise every hour. To wake up at 5am. To journal, meditate, cold plunge, and then grind for 14 hours.

Nobody talks about what gets sacrificed in that equation.

The phone call to your mom you were too tired to make. The weekend with your dog you spent sleeping because your body couldn't take anymore. The friend you keep saying "let's catch up soon" to and never do.

More often than not, the people who suffer the most when we give our time to achievement are the people we're achieving for.

· · ·

So here's what I've been thinking about.

The biggest gift you can give yourself is to make sure that your time-value relationship is leading to an outcome which eventually increases the time you give your loved ones. Not decreases it.

Try doing that without compromising on the time you give them right now. Because the more you make time for your goals in a way that leads to that outcome, the more you work towards actual fulfilment — not just productivity.

Sit down with yourself and have this conversation. Because who knows — the insights you get might just change your life for the better.

— Richa