164. Change Your Relationship to Time
Do you find yourself feeling overwhelmed by time? How you relate to time has a significant impact on how you manage your business and personal goals. Shifting your mindset can help you move from a place of pressure and scarcity to one of ease, allowing you to focus on what matters most.
In this episode, I guide you through the process of reshaping your relationship with time. By viewing it as a resource that supports you, you'll feel more control over your day and less stressed about meeting your goals. This shift will help you use time intentionally, making it work in your favor.
When you start treating time as a tool instead of something to fight against, you’ll prioritize tasks with clarity and purpose. I’ll share how to overcome the pressure of always “doing more” and how to make time work for you, giving you the freedom to achieve your goals and live in alignment with your values.
If you've been thinking about working with me one-on-one, be sure to get on the private coaching waitlist! Click here to learn more about Design to Thrive and secure your spot to be the first to know when availability opens up.
What You’ll Discover from this Episode:
How to view time as a supportive tool.
Why your mindset about time impacts your business success.
How to reduce pressure by changing how you relate to time.
Practical steps to use time intentionally for your goals.
Why building a schedule that works for you is key to productivity.
How to stop feeling rushed and start being more present.
How to align your actions with your core priorities.
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Full Episode Transcript:
Hey designer, you are listening to episode 164. This is going to be a quick one, but a really important episode. I'm going to share with you, really, one of the most overlooked pieces of time management. It's not necessarily a tip or a strategy, and I'm sure you haven't heard this before. And it definitely goes beyond just another time-blocking hack.
The concept I'm talking about today, when you hear this and apply it to how you spend each and every 24-hour day cycle, it will fundamentally change the way you feel day-to-day, the effectiveness of how you block and manage your time, the ability to focus and bring presence to your most important work. And honestly, it's going to help you move beyond just trying to master some latest calendar strategy.
You're going to finally feel like time is on your side. And it all starts with your relationship with time. We're going to dive into what exactly do I mean by that and how you can use it to leverage the incredible resource you have of time in your interior design business to get the results that you want.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you're ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you're in the right place.
I'm Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let's go.
Hello designer, welcome back to the podcast. I am sitting down here, and it's kind of interesting. I, well, now it's been a couple of days, but I am settling back into work after being gone for a little bit. My husband and I got to go away to Mexico City. It was our first time there, and it was so incredible. And why I was saying that was kind of interesting was I had put together some notes for this on the way there. And sometimes I do that, and then I go, oh, what was I even going to talk about? And I come back and go, oh yeah, this is an excellent topic. I'm so glad to be here with you.
Just to circle back to Mexico City, if you have not been there and have an opportunity to go or are looking for a new city to check out, it was really fantastic. The city is so interesting. There's all of these different neighborhoods. What did they call them? Oh, delegations, I think, is what our tour guide said they call them. It's like these delineations between different neighborhoods. And the food was so wonderful. The history was really fascinating.
We went on a hot air balloon tour. That was incredible. I was really worried that I was going to get there and be terrified, but it was actually really peaceful. So, who knows? Thank goodness for coaching. It's one of those moments where I go, thank goodness that I don't let the sign of being nervous or feel scared to totally derail me from doing something that I actually want to do and want to experience.
But all that to say, let's dive into the topic. This is something that I was sharing about when I was hosting a call for Business of Home recently. And if you're a member of Business of Home, make sure you go into their on-demand launch trainings. I have three classes in there now that are available for you to watch and learn from, and that's all included in your membership if you already have that. But what I was doing was I was walking the designers through a coaching exercise, and what I realized is I have never talked about this on the podcast, and it would be so helpful for you to all hear this. And this concept was all about your relationship with time.
Now, if you hear that and go, wait, I have a relationship with time? Time is not alive, Desi, it is not a person. Except it kind of is. You are in a committed relationship with the hours in the day, whether you realize it or not. Time is your constant companion, and if you use it properly, it is a valuable partner in helping you achieve your goals. And that really depends on how you relate to it, so that the hours in the day become something that supports you, that helps you fulfill your mission, and live into your values and achieve those goals. Instead of being something that you're always chasing or fighting against.
I'm going to walk you through a little bit more about what I mean by this concept so that you can have a broader understanding, and then we're going to dive into some coaching questions so you can do some reflection as you listen to this and start to apply the concept immediately. Before I do that, I do want to give a quick shout-out to Hackett House Studio, and their firm shared my podcast on Instagram saying that the podcast has been really transformational for them in specifically the area of time management.
So I wanted to say thank you, Hackett House. Thank you for sharing that. And I also want you all to know that when you share the podcast, whether that's on Instagram or you share it with a design friend and say, hey, check this out, it really does help new designers come to the show and introduce them to this really, really effective combination of strategy, emotions, and mindset. And I do appreciate every single one of you who leaves a review and tells somebody about it. It really does matter. So thank you, Hackett House Studio, and also thank you to all of you who've shared the podcast in some way or for you, if you're thinking about sharing it, go for it, do it. You're going to help somebody else.
Okay, so back to the episode. Let's talk about what I mean when I say you have a relationship with time. And then, why exactly does that matter? Why does the tone, the quality, and the dynamic in that relationship really become an essential piece of your success and your fulfillment in your interior design business?
You hear a relationship, and usually, we think about a relationship with another human being. And often, yes, we are in a lot of relationships with other people. But what you might not realize is that you can have a relationship with anything and anyone.
Relationships, the way that I think of them and the way that I teach this, is that all relationships are rooted and created in the thoughts that you have about another person or another thing. And in this case, we're talking about that thing being time. Whether it's hours in a day, an object that's in your home, a spouse or a child or a friend, a relationship is never an actual object that exists as its own entity that you could hold and say, yes, this is its own thing that exists outside of the two elements that really like come together for a relationship to exist.
And we know this because it's how I can feel like I have a relationship with you, and you can even feel like you have a relationship with me, and it's quite possible that we've never even met each other. And that's because when I sit down to record, I'm thinking about you. I have an image and an emotional state where I am picturing you, even if I don't know you exactly, I know you as a listener. And you probably have that with me, too.
And we also can see the example of how you can have a relationship with someone that lives on, that the person is no longer physically present. Maybe it's a person that has moved away and you see much less frequently. I can think of friends of mine from college where we don't see each other all that often, we don't talk all that often, and yet we have that really strong relationship because I'm actively thinking about them in a certain way even when we are not together. It could be someone that's no longer living, right?
And maybe even a pet. This is a great example, too. You could feel connected and attuned to a pet because of the relationship that you have with them that is based on the thoughts.
It was kind of funny when we came home from Mexico City, my dog, Olive, many of you have heard of her, she is a real sweetheart, and I'm definitely her person. See, again, there's a thought. I'm like, I, I'm her favorite, right? But she wanted to sit in my lap when we got home, and I just was like, oh, I feel like Olive is just relaxing, and she's like, oh, finally, my person's home. I can just, I can settle finally, right? But all of that is a story I'm telling myself about this, you know, dynamic that I have with Olive. And of course, like she greets me, she's excited to see me, and I have evidence that yes, my dog loves me. And I have a story about it.
So we can create relationships, we can maintain and nurture them. Sometimes we end them, and that's because of the stories we're telling and the stories that we continue to rehearse about the other person or other thing. And that definitely is true for time. What I want you to know, either for the first time, if you're brand new to this podcast or remember if you've been a long time listener, is that the thoughts you choose, whether that's on default or intentionally as in like, I'm going to choose to believe this, our thoughts are always optional, they're fluid, and they're going to directly impact how you take action. And in this case, it's how you leverage the important resource of time in your business.
The thoughts are definitely optional, and the beliefs can change about time, and it can be just like people. I'm giving you lots of examples with people here because I want you to see that everything that's true about how you think or believe about someone else, it applies here to your relationship with time, and it's going to be an important piece of your time management. We'll go into what exactly you're thinking about time. Maybe you're already thinking of some ideas, right? Maybe some ideas are already coming to mind already. But one thing I want you to consider is maybe something that you've had a change in mind about.
So a person that you used to have lots and warm and fuzzy thoughts about, but then maybe you started to distrust them, or maybe you grew, and what you wanted is no longer in alignment with how they live their life. And maybe it's someone even who was really off-putting when you first met them. It's like the reverse. But then over time, you came to enjoy their company, and you started shifting the story to impact the relationship.
Maybe with the example of time, there are days where you feel like time is expansive, and maybe there are days when you're rushed and crunched. Now, of course, we could look at, well, how many things are scheduled, how many hours you have to work, all of those things.
And we've all had those experiences where time feels different, even if the exact same things are happening. Time can feel slow, it can feel fast, and we have that experience because of our thoughts. So whether it's a person you're in a relationship with, or you're in a relationship with time, we also know that there's no one truth about the relationship. You could think about a celebrity, maybe, that you love, but another person strongly dislikes them, or just is sort of indifferent to. The qualities that you focus on in the person are not because the person just is that amazing or is that awful.
Okay. And again, we could talk about values and all of that, right? Right? But like even think about maybe a best friend or something like that, where you're like, this is my person. How could anyone think anything less of that person? Why isn't everyone their best friend? But it's because we're all different. We have different preferences, thoughts, perceptions, value systems, all of that. And that lens through which we view the relationship is going to impact how we engage, how we feel, and what we do throughout our time in the relationship.
I often hear from designers that there's just never enough time. But never enough is just not a true fact about time. Everyone has the same hours of day. I think everyone's heard that saying, right? Beyoncé has the same 24 hours. Of course. Okay. But if you think about maybe you have four hours to complete a task, and you think that's not enough. And then someone else says, oh, that's plenty of time. That's great. That's more than I need. Or maybe somebody else has the approach of, well, that might be kind of tight, but I could make it work. So there's no concrete absolute that we can agree on. And that is evidence of the fluidity of our thoughts and in relation to the circumstances, how they are optional and how everyone has a different relationship with the same thing, which we're talking about time today.
Throughout the life of this podcast, I've talked a lot about the thought-feeling-action-result model that is really a way to demonstrate how when we think about something, it has a ripple effect. The thoughts that we have generate an emotional experience for us that then goes on to fuel everything we do or don't do, and that's going to of course create some kind of outcome for you.
If relationships are all thoughts, and here we're having thoughts about time, that means that the way that you think about time will directly impact how effective you are with scheduling and determines even if you try and schedule your day at all, right? Because if you have this really fraught relationship with time, you're probably not even going to bother engaging with it. It also really impacts what you say yes and no to, how you prioritize and place value on the various things that you choose to do or not do, how you feel throughout the day, and especially what the pace is in which you experience hours.
So when we're talking about a relationship with time, yes, it's very much a mindset tool and a mindset coaching exercise. And at the same time, there is a real direct link that you'll see when it comes to how you're able to use effective time management strategies that all start with your relationship to the hours in the day. Whether it's time blocking you do, creating theme days, working with your energy, there's so many different ways that you can utilize the resource of time. But it all is going to be more effective if you have a strong relationship with time, where it feels like you are using it as a winning resource instead of feeling like you're always losing.
One of the ways I like to think about this is that time management is a writing utensil. It is a tool. So you could think about it like a pencil. So the pencil being maybe time blocking. And with a pencil, there's lots of ways that you could use it in any shape or form. And as long as there's some lead exposed, you'll be able to write something. But if it's worn down to a nub, maybe the eraser has popped off, or the tip is round and it's very dull. Like, I'm thinking about those little nubs that somehow the kids always put into our pencil drawer. And I'm like, okay, this is past its prime. We do not need to hold on to this. But that's what I'm picturing you writing with when you have a poor relationship with time, okay? It's going to be so much harder to write with this little nub that is dull, and you can't ever erase, okay, the little metal thing that goes around the eraser just scratches your paper.
So that's where it's like having this insight into your relationship with time, and then using the awareness to proactively shift your thoughts about the hours in the day, it's like giving yourself a pencil sharpener. Everything you do with the same tool, which is the pencil, becomes better, and it becomes easier.
I'll also say that even if you feel like you're pretty good at managing your time, like you have the time that you want to do the things that you're invested in doing, I do want you to keep listening for these prompts that I'm going to give you.
There was a really interesting example that came up when I was coaching the women on the Business of Home call, where even if you have a good relationship, sometimes there are some sneaky blind spots that can throw you for a loop that you still want to be aware of.
So we're going to explore that dynamic, and I'm going to give you some prompts that you can use to really start to work through this on your own. And then that's going to help you more effectively use some of the more tactical approaches that I give you on this podcast as well.
The very first thing I want you to do is picture time as if it's another person. And then I want you to describe your relationship with this person. Maybe it's supportive, or it's tense, steady, or inconsistent, maybe it's calm, or it's dramatic. I can think of how my relationship with time, or how I describe it, has really shifted over the years.
One of the examples that came to mind was thinking about when my kids were little. Now I have two kids. They're nine and 12 now. But I can remember when they were little, and they still napped. And there was a period of time where they both were still napping, and sometimes those naps would overlap. And I had a really greedy relationship with time at that point. I was like, there's never enough time, never enough alone. Like, there's too much to do, always things I want to be doing and I can't do it, and da da da da, right? And so, because I had that greedy relationship with time, when the kids would nap, what I found was I would actually get really overwhelmed because there were so many things I was trying to like grasp onto to do that I ended up not doing any of it because it was like this frantic energy with how I was going to utilize that hour window. And it ended up being to my detriment.
So that's the very first thing is just picture time as a person and describe the relationship. Then I want you to consider what are the thoughts that are creating that dynamic? Okay, because relationships are created with the thoughts we have about the other person, thing, place, okay? So maybe the thought is I never have enough, or maybe I have plenty of time. That's the example I'm going to give you in a little bit, which is really interesting, okay? So keep listening.
Maybe it is I always need more, or something is always happening here. Like that's kind of that drama, right? If you think about if you're having another person across from you, you being like, I always need more of you. You're never enough, right? It's kind of funny to think about and brings a little levity to this as well.
Then, once you've done that, once you know about that dynamic, what the thoughts are that are creating that relationship, I want you to consider how does that type of relationship create challenges in your business or get you in your own way? This could look like if time is something that you feel like you can never get enough of, how does that impact the way that you feel throughout the day? Maybe it's that you are always anxious or on edge, right?
And we've talked about this on the podcast, but when our emotions are high like that, our intelligence is low. We have less access to the parts of our brain that are in charge of strategic decision making, planning, executive function. Okay, so not as effective when you have that on edge feeling. Maybe the relationship is impacting how you plan your day. Instead of setting a realistic plan based on some constrained priorities, you're trying to pack every last thing into the day, hoping it gets done, when then far less gets done, and that is to a detriment to your business success.
Now, this is the example I wanted to bring you that's kind of like a little bit of a mind bender, right? So this one woman that I was coaching on the call, she came on, and she said, oh, this is really interesting doing these questions, and you know, I feel like I have a pretty good relationship with time. Like I have plenty of time.
And one of the things that she said when we talked about challenges is that she said, well, actually when I think that I have plenty of time, in a lot of ways that's good, and what it can produce is me saying yes way too often because if I believe I have plenty of this resource, right, I don't always check to see what my actual capacity is. I just sort of say, “yes, of course, I have time” without looking at what am I actually committing to. And so that was creating a challenge, which I just thought was so interesting.
And I see that sometimes when I have a day where maybe I don't have any calls scheduled. I'll have thoughts like, I've got the whole day ahead of me. Like I'm free. And if I do not make some plans for the day and decide what's going to get done, how I'm going to approach it, what ends up happening is time just starts to bleed, and things take a lot longer than they need to. I am less focused. So believing that you have plenty of time sometimes actually can be a challenge too. So that's why this awareness is so important because having the thought of I have a plenty of this could be really useful for you, or it could be creating challenges. And then maybe it's just in some instances it's really useful, and in some instances it's really not. So you want to know what's going on.
The last few things I want you to consider are what would you like your relationship with time to look or feel like? Okay? So I like to think of time as a supportive resource that is always available and at my disposal. It is a steady presence that moves with me and not something that I work against.
Now, your answer to this could be completely different. Maybe you try my answer on, whatever. And of course, I want to be very clear. Like having that relationship with time doesn't mean I never have the thought of, oh, I wish I had more time or start to feel a little graspy.
But the difference is now when I see that type of thinking, I can return to my belief that there are hours in the day, and those hours are here to help me accomplish my goals and live my values. And really, there's never going to be time to do it all, whatever it all is. And when I remember that time's not trying to taunt me, it is there for me to use to make intentional decisions, and what happens is then I just re-establish what my priorities are. I get clear on what is and isn't happening, and then that actually builds trust in the partnership that I have with time.
Okay, so think about what you'd like that relationship to be. And then if you made that shift, how would that influence the way that you set goals, you prioritize, how you manage time, or lead your projects or your team? So bring to mind whatever it is that you tend to struggle with, and consider what would be different about the results you could create and how you would also feel day to day if you made this change.
And then the last one I want to leave you with here in terms of questions is with this newfound awareness, with this exploration, what is one small shift you're going to make? How are you going to take what you've just noticed and use that awareness to make a tiny shift? It could be very small. It could be a little bit bigger, but make sure it's doable and does not feel like you are overhauling everything because that's probably not going to work.
So it might be related to scheduling, maybe pausing and redirecting when you notice a storyline that deteriorates your relationship with time. If you think about it again as another person, like think about sitting around complaining about someone, not super useful and only just reinforces the story you have. It may be as simple as you notice when you complain about time to stop doing it, to say, nope, not going there today. Maybe you stop using the word busy. Could be a lot of different things. And maybe, maybe that tiny shift is looking at your to-dos for the day and cutting out those, oh, it would be nice to get done, and get laser focused on what's actually going to move the needle today.
Just decide what it is for you. There's no right or wrong action, but I want you to get going on this. You do not have to wait. You can start shifting your relationship now, and you will start to see the ripple effect. I promise you. You're going to be able to leverage your time so much more effectively.
And the time management tools that I've taught you here on this podcast, they're going to work better. And what's going to happen is you're just going to be much more intentional about your choices, about tradeoffs you make, and you're going to learn to respect your time and that relationship. And that really means respect yourself, okay? Because when we are in a fraught relationship with time, that really starts to erode self-trust. So we want to be aware of that as well because what I want for you is to feel supported, to feel more abundant, and for you to be able to use time as a tool to create the version of success that you want to have in your interior design business.
Remember that there's always a transcript for the episode. You can go to my website. There's a podcast page if you want to take these prompts to your journal. And if you want to dive even more into some time management, remember there's the Interior Designers Get It Done Daily Planner. You can get that at desicreswell.com/planner. It's a totally free resource.
I have been sharing this for years now and designers say it's a game-changer. And that's because it not only shares time management tips, it also gives you the mindset and specific prompts you can use in your planning to really shift how you leverage time. I guarantee you will save at least 5 hours per week. So consider that's 20 hours per month. Think of what you could do with an additional 20 hours. So if you haven't given this a try, if you haven't downloaded the planner, go ahead, do that now. It's desicreswell.com/planner. Like I said, it's free, and I'd love to hear what you do with it, and I'd also love to hear what you think of this episode.
I'm going to be back in 2 weeks with a brand new topic, and I also have some behind-the-scenes stuff that I'm going to be sharing fairly soon and an announcement. So you want to make sure you're subscribed to the podcast because that's how you don't miss out on these upcoming conversations. I know with me, I listen to a lot of podcasts, and it's basically impossible for me to remember to go check the feed. So it's so much easier, you just hit that subscribe button, and then you make sure it's there when it comes out on a Wednesday. Until we speak again, I'm wishing you a beautiful week, and I look forward to hearing how you shift your relationship with time.
Thanks for joining me for this week's episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit DesiCreswell.com, where you’ll get immediate access to a variety of free resources to help you take what you learn on the podcast and put it into action. And if you love what you’re hearing, be sure to rate, review, and follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts to ensure you never miss an episode. I’ll talk to you next week.
The concept I'm talking about today, when you hear this and apply it to how you spend each and every 24-hour day cycle, it will fundamentally change the way you feel day-to-day, the effectiveness of how you block and manage your time, the ability to focus and bring presence to your most important work. And honestly, it's going to help you move beyond just trying to master some latest calendar strategy.
You're going to finally feel like time is on your side. And it all starts with your relationship with time. We're going to dive into what exactly do I mean by that and how you can use it to leverage the incredible resource you have of time in your interior design business to get the results that you want.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you're ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you're in the right place.
I'm Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let's go.
Hello designer, welcome back to the podcast. I am sitting down here, and it's kind of interesting. I, well, now it's been a couple of days, but I am settling back into work after being gone for a little bit. My husband and I got to go away to Mexico City. It was our first time there, and it was so incredible. And why I was saying that was kind of interesting was I had put together some notes for this on the way there. And sometimes I do that, and then I go, oh, what was I even going to talk about? And I come back and go, oh yeah, this is an excellent topic. I'm so glad to be here with you.
Just to circle back to Mexico City, if you have not been there and have an opportunity to go or are looking for a new city to check out, it was really fantastic. The city is so interesting. There's all of these different neighborhoods. What did they call them? Oh, delegations, I think, is what our tour guide said they call them. It's like these delineations between different neighborhoods. And the food was so wonderful. The history was really fascinating.
We went on a hot air balloon tour. That was incredible. I was really worried that I was going to get there and be terrified, but it was actually really peaceful. So, who knows? Thank goodness for coaching. It's one of those moments where I go, thank goodness that I don't let the sign of being nervous or feel scared to totally derail me from doing something that I actually want to do and want to experience.
But all that to say, let's dive into the topic. This is something that I was sharing about when I was hosting a call for Business of Home recently. And if you're a member of Business of Home, make sure you go into their on-demand launch trainings. I have three classes in there now that are available for you to watch and learn from, and that's all included in your membership if you already have that. But what I was doing was I was walking the designers through a coaching exercise, and what I realized is I have never talked about this on the podcast, and it would be so helpful for you to all hear this. And this concept was all about your relationship with time.
Now, if you hear that and go, wait, I have a relationship with time? Time is not alive, Desi, it is not a person. Except it kind of is. You are in a committed relationship with the hours in the day, whether you realize it or not. Time is your constant companion, and if you use it properly, it is a valuable partner in helping you achieve your goals. And that really depends on how you relate to it, so that the hours in the day become something that supports you, that helps you fulfill your mission, and live into your values and achieve those goals. Instead of being something that you're always chasing or fighting against.
I'm going to walk you through a little bit more about what I mean by this concept so that you can have a broader understanding, and then we're going to dive into some coaching questions so you can do some reflection as you listen to this and start to apply the concept immediately. Before I do that, I do want to give a quick shout-out to Hackett House Studio, and their firm shared my podcast on Instagram saying that the podcast has been really transformational for them in specifically the area of time management.
So I wanted to say thank you, Hackett House. Thank you for sharing that. And I also want you all to know that when you share the podcast, whether that's on Instagram or you share it with a design friend and say, hey, check this out, it really does help new designers come to the show and introduce them to this really, really effective combination of strategy, emotions, and mindset. And I do appreciate every single one of you who leaves a review and tells somebody about it. It really does matter. So thank you, Hackett House Studio, and also thank you to all of you who've shared the podcast in some way or for you, if you're thinking about sharing it, go for it, do it. You're going to help somebody else.
Okay, so back to the episode. Let's talk about what I mean when I say you have a relationship with time. And then, why exactly does that matter? Why does the tone, the quality, and the dynamic in that relationship really become an essential piece of your success and your fulfillment in your interior design business?
You hear a relationship, and usually, we think about a relationship with another human being. And often, yes, we are in a lot of relationships with other people. But what you might not realize is that you can have a relationship with anything and anyone.
Relationships, the way that I think of them and the way that I teach this, is that all relationships are rooted and created in the thoughts that you have about another person or another thing. And in this case, we're talking about that thing being time. Whether it's hours in a day, an object that's in your home, a spouse or a child or a friend, a relationship is never an actual object that exists as its own entity that you could hold and say, yes, this is its own thing that exists outside of the two elements that really like come together for a relationship to exist.
And we know this because it's how I can feel like I have a relationship with you, and you can even feel like you have a relationship with me, and it's quite possible that we've never even met each other. And that's because when I sit down to record, I'm thinking about you. I have an image and an emotional state where I am picturing you, even if I don't know you exactly, I know you as a listener. And you probably have that with me, too.
And we also can see the example of how you can have a relationship with someone that lives on, that the person is no longer physically present. Maybe it's a person that has moved away and you see much less frequently. I can think of friends of mine from college where we don't see each other all that often, we don't talk all that often, and yet we have that really strong relationship because I'm actively thinking about them in a certain way even when we are not together. It could be someone that's no longer living, right?
And maybe even a pet. This is a great example, too. You could feel connected and attuned to a pet because of the relationship that you have with them that is based on the thoughts.
It was kind of funny when we came home from Mexico City, my dog, Olive, many of you have heard of her, she is a real sweetheart, and I'm definitely her person. See, again, there's a thought. I'm like, I, I'm her favorite, right? But she wanted to sit in my lap when we got home, and I just was like, oh, I feel like Olive is just relaxing, and she's like, oh, finally, my person's home. I can just, I can settle finally, right? But all of that is a story I'm telling myself about this, you know, dynamic that I have with Olive. And of course, like she greets me, she's excited to see me, and I have evidence that yes, my dog loves me. And I have a story about it.
So we can create relationships, we can maintain and nurture them. Sometimes we end them, and that's because of the stories we're telling and the stories that we continue to rehearse about the other person or other thing. And that definitely is true for time. What I want you to know, either for the first time, if you're brand new to this podcast or remember if you've been a long time listener, is that the thoughts you choose, whether that's on default or intentionally as in like, I'm going to choose to believe this, our thoughts are always optional, they're fluid, and they're going to directly impact how you take action. And in this case, it's how you leverage the important resource of time in your business.
The thoughts are definitely optional, and the beliefs can change about time, and it can be just like people. I'm giving you lots of examples with people here because I want you to see that everything that's true about how you think or believe about someone else, it applies here to your relationship with time, and it's going to be an important piece of your time management. We'll go into what exactly you're thinking about time. Maybe you're already thinking of some ideas, right? Maybe some ideas are already coming to mind already. But one thing I want you to consider is maybe something that you've had a change in mind about.
So a person that you used to have lots and warm and fuzzy thoughts about, but then maybe you started to distrust them, or maybe you grew, and what you wanted is no longer in alignment with how they live their life. And maybe it's someone even who was really off-putting when you first met them. It's like the reverse. But then over time, you came to enjoy their company, and you started shifting the story to impact the relationship.
Maybe with the example of time, there are days where you feel like time is expansive, and maybe there are days when you're rushed and crunched. Now, of course, we could look at, well, how many things are scheduled, how many hours you have to work, all of those things.
And we've all had those experiences where time feels different, even if the exact same things are happening. Time can feel slow, it can feel fast, and we have that experience because of our thoughts. So whether it's a person you're in a relationship with, or you're in a relationship with time, we also know that there's no one truth about the relationship. You could think about a celebrity, maybe, that you love, but another person strongly dislikes them, or just is sort of indifferent to. The qualities that you focus on in the person are not because the person just is that amazing or is that awful.
Okay. And again, we could talk about values and all of that, right? Right? But like even think about maybe a best friend or something like that, where you're like, this is my person. How could anyone think anything less of that person? Why isn't everyone their best friend? But it's because we're all different. We have different preferences, thoughts, perceptions, value systems, all of that. And that lens through which we view the relationship is going to impact how we engage, how we feel, and what we do throughout our time in the relationship.
I often hear from designers that there's just never enough time. But never enough is just not a true fact about time. Everyone has the same hours of day. I think everyone's heard that saying, right? Beyoncé has the same 24 hours. Of course. Okay. But if you think about maybe you have four hours to complete a task, and you think that's not enough. And then someone else says, oh, that's plenty of time. That's great. That's more than I need. Or maybe somebody else has the approach of, well, that might be kind of tight, but I could make it work. So there's no concrete absolute that we can agree on. And that is evidence of the fluidity of our thoughts and in relation to the circumstances, how they are optional and how everyone has a different relationship with the same thing, which we're talking about time today.
Throughout the life of this podcast, I've talked a lot about the thought-feeling-action-result model that is really a way to demonstrate how when we think about something, it has a ripple effect. The thoughts that we have generate an emotional experience for us that then goes on to fuel everything we do or don't do, and that's going to of course create some kind of outcome for you.
If relationships are all thoughts, and here we're having thoughts about time, that means that the way that you think about time will directly impact how effective you are with scheduling and determines even if you try and schedule your day at all, right? Because if you have this really fraught relationship with time, you're probably not even going to bother engaging with it. It also really impacts what you say yes and no to, how you prioritize and place value on the various things that you choose to do or not do, how you feel throughout the day, and especially what the pace is in which you experience hours.
So when we're talking about a relationship with time, yes, it's very much a mindset tool and a mindset coaching exercise. And at the same time, there is a real direct link that you'll see when it comes to how you're able to use effective time management strategies that all start with your relationship to the hours in the day. Whether it's time blocking you do, creating theme days, working with your energy, there's so many different ways that you can utilize the resource of time. But it all is going to be more effective if you have a strong relationship with time, where it feels like you are using it as a winning resource instead of feeling like you're always losing.
One of the ways I like to think about this is that time management is a writing utensil. It is a tool. So you could think about it like a pencil. So the pencil being maybe time blocking. And with a pencil, there's lots of ways that you could use it in any shape or form. And as long as there's some lead exposed, you'll be able to write something. But if it's worn down to a nub, maybe the eraser has popped off, or the tip is round and it's very dull. Like, I'm thinking about those little nubs that somehow the kids always put into our pencil drawer. And I'm like, okay, this is past its prime. We do not need to hold on to this. But that's what I'm picturing you writing with when you have a poor relationship with time, okay? It's going to be so much harder to write with this little nub that is dull, and you can't ever erase, okay, the little metal thing that goes around the eraser just scratches your paper.
So that's where it's like having this insight into your relationship with time, and then using the awareness to proactively shift your thoughts about the hours in the day, it's like giving yourself a pencil sharpener. Everything you do with the same tool, which is the pencil, becomes better, and it becomes easier.
I'll also say that even if you feel like you're pretty good at managing your time, like you have the time that you want to do the things that you're invested in doing, I do want you to keep listening for these prompts that I'm going to give you.
There was a really interesting example that came up when I was coaching the women on the Business of Home call, where even if you have a good relationship, sometimes there are some sneaky blind spots that can throw you for a loop that you still want to be aware of.
So we're going to explore that dynamic, and I'm going to give you some prompts that you can use to really start to work through this on your own. And then that's going to help you more effectively use some of the more tactical approaches that I give you on this podcast as well.
The very first thing I want you to do is picture time as if it's another person. And then I want you to describe your relationship with this person. Maybe it's supportive, or it's tense, steady, or inconsistent, maybe it's calm, or it's dramatic. I can think of how my relationship with time, or how I describe it, has really shifted over the years.
One of the examples that came to mind was thinking about when my kids were little. Now I have two kids. They're nine and 12 now. But I can remember when they were little, and they still napped. And there was a period of time where they both were still napping, and sometimes those naps would overlap. And I had a really greedy relationship with time at that point. I was like, there's never enough time, never enough alone. Like, there's too much to do, always things I want to be doing and I can't do it, and da da da da, right? And so, because I had that greedy relationship with time, when the kids would nap, what I found was I would actually get really overwhelmed because there were so many things I was trying to like grasp onto to do that I ended up not doing any of it because it was like this frantic energy with how I was going to utilize that hour window. And it ended up being to my detriment.
So that's the very first thing is just picture time as a person and describe the relationship. Then I want you to consider what are the thoughts that are creating that dynamic? Okay, because relationships are created with the thoughts we have about the other person, thing, place, okay? So maybe the thought is I never have enough, or maybe I have plenty of time. That's the example I'm going to give you in a little bit, which is really interesting, okay? So keep listening.
Maybe it is I always need more, or something is always happening here. Like that's kind of that drama, right? If you think about if you're having another person across from you, you being like, I always need more of you. You're never enough, right? It's kind of funny to think about and brings a little levity to this as well.
Then, once you've done that, once you know about that dynamic, what the thoughts are that are creating that relationship, I want you to consider how does that type of relationship create challenges in your business or get you in your own way? This could look like if time is something that you feel like you can never get enough of, how does that impact the way that you feel throughout the day? Maybe it's that you are always anxious or on edge, right?
And we've talked about this on the podcast, but when our emotions are high like that, our intelligence is low. We have less access to the parts of our brain that are in charge of strategic decision making, planning, executive function. Okay, so not as effective when you have that on edge feeling. Maybe the relationship is impacting how you plan your day. Instead of setting a realistic plan based on some constrained priorities, you're trying to pack every last thing into the day, hoping it gets done, when then far less gets done, and that is to a detriment to your business success.
Now, this is the example I wanted to bring you that's kind of like a little bit of a mind bender, right? So this one woman that I was coaching on the call, she came on, and she said, oh, this is really interesting doing these questions, and you know, I feel like I have a pretty good relationship with time. Like I have plenty of time.
And one of the things that she said when we talked about challenges is that she said, well, actually when I think that I have plenty of time, in a lot of ways that's good, and what it can produce is me saying yes way too often because if I believe I have plenty of this resource, right, I don't always check to see what my actual capacity is. I just sort of say, “yes, of course, I have time” without looking at what am I actually committing to. And so that was creating a challenge, which I just thought was so interesting.
And I see that sometimes when I have a day where maybe I don't have any calls scheduled. I'll have thoughts like, I've got the whole day ahead of me. Like I'm free. And if I do not make some plans for the day and decide what's going to get done, how I'm going to approach it, what ends up happening is time just starts to bleed, and things take a lot longer than they need to. I am less focused. So believing that you have plenty of time sometimes actually can be a challenge too. So that's why this awareness is so important because having the thought of I have a plenty of this could be really useful for you, or it could be creating challenges. And then maybe it's just in some instances it's really useful, and in some instances it's really not. So you want to know what's going on.
The last few things I want you to consider are what would you like your relationship with time to look or feel like? Okay? So I like to think of time as a supportive resource that is always available and at my disposal. It is a steady presence that moves with me and not something that I work against.
Now, your answer to this could be completely different. Maybe you try my answer on, whatever. And of course, I want to be very clear. Like having that relationship with time doesn't mean I never have the thought of, oh, I wish I had more time or start to feel a little graspy.
But the difference is now when I see that type of thinking, I can return to my belief that there are hours in the day, and those hours are here to help me accomplish my goals and live my values. And really, there's never going to be time to do it all, whatever it all is. And when I remember that time's not trying to taunt me, it is there for me to use to make intentional decisions, and what happens is then I just re-establish what my priorities are. I get clear on what is and isn't happening, and then that actually builds trust in the partnership that I have with time.
Okay, so think about what you'd like that relationship to be. And then if you made that shift, how would that influence the way that you set goals, you prioritize, how you manage time, or lead your projects or your team? So bring to mind whatever it is that you tend to struggle with, and consider what would be different about the results you could create and how you would also feel day to day if you made this change.
And then the last one I want to leave you with here in terms of questions is with this newfound awareness, with this exploration, what is one small shift you're going to make? How are you going to take what you've just noticed and use that awareness to make a tiny shift? It could be very small. It could be a little bit bigger, but make sure it's doable and does not feel like you are overhauling everything because that's probably not going to work.
So it might be related to scheduling, maybe pausing and redirecting when you notice a storyline that deteriorates your relationship with time. If you think about it again as another person, like think about sitting around complaining about someone, not super useful and only just reinforces the story you have. It may be as simple as you notice when you complain about time to stop doing it, to say, nope, not going there today. Maybe you stop using the word busy. Could be a lot of different things. And maybe, maybe that tiny shift is looking at your to-dos for the day and cutting out those, oh, it would be nice to get done, and get laser focused on what's actually going to move the needle today.
Just decide what it is for you. There's no right or wrong action, but I want you to get going on this. You do not have to wait. You can start shifting your relationship now, and you will start to see the ripple effect. I promise you. You're going to be able to leverage your time so much more effectively.
And the time management tools that I've taught you here on this podcast, they're going to work better. And what's going to happen is you're just going to be much more intentional about your choices, about tradeoffs you make, and you're going to learn to respect your time and that relationship. And that really means respect yourself, okay? Because when we are in a fraught relationship with time, that really starts to erode self-trust. So we want to be aware of that as well because what I want for you is to feel supported, to feel more abundant, and for you to be able to use time as a tool to create the version of success that you want to have in your interior design business.
Remember that there's always a transcript for the episode. You can go to my website. There's a podcast page if you want to take these prompts to your journal. And if you want to dive even more into some time management, remember there's the Interior Designers Get It Done Daily Planner. You can get that at desicreswell.com/planner. It's a totally free resource.
I have been sharing this for years now and designers say it's a game-changer. And that's because it not only shares time management tips, it also gives you the mindset and specific prompts you can use in your planning to really shift how you leverage time. I guarantee you will save at least 5 hours per week. So consider that's 20 hours per month. Think of what you could do with an additional 20 hours. So if you haven't given this a try, if you haven't downloaded the planner, go ahead, do that now. It's desicreswell.com/planner. Like I said, it's free, and I'd love to hear what you do with it, and I'd also love to hear what you think of this episode.
I'm going to be back in 2 weeks with a brand new topic, and I also have some behind-the-scenes stuff that I'm going to be sharing fairly soon and an announcement. So you want to make sure you're subscribed to the podcast because that's how you don't miss out on these upcoming conversations. I know with me, I listen to a lot of podcasts, and it's basically impossible for me to remember to go check the feed. So it's so much easier, you just hit that subscribe button, and then you make sure it's there when it comes out on a Wednesday. Until we speak again, I'm wishing you a beautiful week, and I look forward to hearing how you shift your relationship with time.
Thanks for joining me for this week's episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit DesiCreswell.com, where you’ll get immediate access to a variety of free resources to help you take what you learn on the podcast and put it into action. And if you love what you’re hearing, be sure to rate, review, and follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts to ensure you never miss an episode. I’ll talk to you next week.
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