QLagoon - Health, wealth and happiness

Want More Spare Time?

Where do you start? How much do you think you’ll need?

The Finding the Time Zone is designed to help us all question our habits as they relate to the activities and lifestyle we believe will make us happier beings.

We often find ourselves complaining that “if only we had more time” we could clear the decks and indulge our favourite pursuits and passions. That and spending more time with the people who count. How often do we stand back and consider where this time might come from? We seem stuck in established patterns of behaviour, particularly those relating to work.

Things are different for us. Retirement dates were hewn in stone 25 years ago and it was unthinkable to buck the system. Many of us however have experienced flexible careers involving several employers and possibly periods of working for ourselves. We certainly lack the blind faith our parents had in the state’s ability to provide and yet most of us enjoy greater levels of affluence and security. The point I’m labouring to make here is that we are in charge, so if we want time and think we can afford it, we can simply take it.

Let’s deal with the big chunks first. The first and most obvious place to look for time is through full or partial retirement. The dream of many is to retire early and so free up huge tracts of time. Why don’t we? It often comes down to money of course, and how much we think we need to see us through.

Surprisingly, for such a calculating and acquisitive bunch, we rarely take time to do the sums. Instead we stay on the treadmill labouring away under three possibly flawed premises.

• Premise 1 – That more work = more wealth
• Premise 2 – More wealth = is good
• Premise 3 – More money = greater security against unforeseen