Energy Management

We hear a lot about time management but much less about energy management. Time is fixed. We all have 24 hours in the day. But energy is fluid. Our effectiveness in that 24 hours is very dependent on the intensity and intentionality of our energy.

I can go for a walk, and after an hour, I may have gone three miles or so. I’ve been working and exercising that entire time. But if I jog that same three miles, I’ll have knocked out the three miles in half the time. By managing my energy and increasing the intensity of my output, I now have more time but still accomplished the same amount of work.

Many areas of our lives work in much the same way. We all know people who are always seem busy, but get very little done because their energy isn’t focused. They hop from task to task, never fully engaging long enough in one thing to be effective. They operate with little intensity or intentionality and thus manage to cram 180 minutes of real work into a ten-hour day.

However, because these people remain “busy,” we assume they are effective. And since they are always moving and experience little downtime, we assume they are managing their time well. But what they have failed to manage is their energy.

Managing time isn’t effective until you have first managed your energy.

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