Why Your SCHEDULE Keeps Falling Apart

When I was young, my father was early for everything. He was obsessively early for everything, as far as I'm concerned. In fact, by the time I was thinking about joining the military at the age of 20, the military's Lombardi rule of time was like breathing for me. I mean, I hadn't even heard of the term yet, but it was such an easy adjustment because that's just the way I live my life.

If you're not familiar with the Lombardi's rule of time is simple. If you don't arrive 15 minutes early to a meeting or event, you're considered late. That's just the way I was raised is the way I live my life. And it's always been very comfortable for me. In fact, at this point in my life, I probably err on the side of like OCD levels on the side of being on time, if not early for every single thing.

However, being on time includes doing all the stuff on your calendar and on your schedule. One of the biggest stressors for a lot of people is always feeling [00:01:00] like they're behind. That's air quotes for all of you listening. And off their schedule because they never seem to stay on time for everything.

Well, this fallible man podcast, I want to talk about why that happens and a simple adjustment to help you fix it. So let's get into it. Here's the million dollar question. How do men like us reach our full potential growing to the men we dream of becoming while taking care of our responsibilities, working, living, being good husbands, fathers, and still take care of ourselves?

Well, that's the big question. And in this podcast, we'll help you with P with those answers. My name is Brent and welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast. So there's a book you may have heard of that sold over 20 million copies and it's conquered all the top selling, best selling lists all over in every noticeable or notable list in existence.

Since it was published six years ago. In fact, as I typed this, I actually looked it [00:02:00] up for you guys. It's currently number three on Amazon right now on the bestsellers. Still six years after it was released. The book's called Atomic Habits by James Clear. If you haven't heard of it, it's a great book. Some of you are shaking your head right now going, yeah, it is an awesome book.

It is. It's a great book. In fact, it's such a great book. I actually give it fairly frequently as a gift to people who don't have it because I think so highly of it. And for me, that's, that's a big compliment. Uh, when we give people books, it's because we care. One of the stories he uses to illustrate a point really spelled it out clearly for me, something that I did subconsciously because of the way I was raised, that.

Not a lot of people seem to do. And that's the fact that we don't account for all the steps involved with various tasks. By the way, welcome to the Fallible Man podcast where [00:03:00] we dive into everything about being a better man, husband, and father. Big shout out to Fallible Nation, our longtime lawyer listeners and a warm welcome to those of you who joined us for the very first time.

Thanks for giving us a chance. We appreciate you choosing to spend some time with us. We know there's a lot competing for your attention. So from the bottom of the heart, it means a lot to us that you would give us a few minutes of your time and I hope you enjoy it. Hope you guys had an excellent Halloween last night and had some good safe fun with your families.

Be sure and click the link down in the description below to join our bi weekly newsletter for exclusive content, insider information and special offers from our guests moving on with our show. Now let's run a simple example to Help add a little clarity because I don't think it's a hard concept, but I just want to make sure you're picking up what I'm putting down.

So I live 36 miles from one of my best friend's houses. The majority of the distance is state highway. Now, right now, according to Google, it would take me 50 minutes [00:04:00] to get those 36 miles. I've driven that route for over 18 years now. The speed limit has been the same except for the last two or three months they just changed the speed limit in part of that.

The traffic has increased over the years as the area has grown. The last four miles of that actually takes about 15 minutes of that trip. Now, I used to have meetings with him on a regular basis with some joint ventures that we work on together. I would go down every week or two, and we and be down there for a meeting, uh, on the board of directors with a couple other guys.

The fact is I have to leave one hour before the meeting to be there on time. It's just a fact for me and I've known it for years in the years of making that trip. I've gotten there 30 minutes early and other times I have rolled in. Right on time or even a few minutes late for that 36 mile trip. And where we may met was usually about 34 miles a little short of his house.

[00:05:00] So what's the deal? Well, let's look at the factors, traffic, type of traffic, road construction, time of day accidents. Do I need to stop on the way there? Are there school zones? What's the weather like? Do I need to warm up the car if the weather's bad? Now that's nine factors to consider for me to be on time.

For meeting with my friend. Pretty, pretty simple, but how about going to the gym to work out when you only have one hour? Say you put an hour in your schedule to work out. Okay. Is that one hour to work out or one hour to do all the things that was required to work out? What I mean, these are the things that people don't account for.

I have stopped what I'm doing. I have to get out of my house and that can be delayed because my wife or my kids, or someone might try and stop me to talk to me before I leave. Cause they realize I'm leaving and all of a sudden everybody realizes they need to talk to you when you're trying to leave. I got to find my gym clothes.

I got to fill my water bottle. [00:06:00] Whether weather's big factor where I live, maybe not where you do. Do I need to warm up the car? Big factor where I live. It's a 10 minute trip mileage wise to the gym on a good day. Time of day. Is the gym busy? Is it school time? Like is traffic up because school's out. Uh, is the gym busy?

Is it really crowded today? Is that really obnoxious jack wad that takes way too many selfies camping on this single piece of equipment? I absolutely need to do with my gym time today and playing on his phone instead of working out. You guys all know who I'm talking about. You have one in your gym and if you're that guy, shame on you.

Get out of there 12 workout, however long I had to work out 13, cool down, drink some water, drink a protein shake, take a shower, change clothes, travel home or to the next stop. Now that's 18 factors and only one of those is the workout. Okay. Are you [00:07:00] getting what I'm starting to put out here? 18 factors that all take time.

Now, some of those, yes, you can multitask. Some of them you can't. Some of them are inconveniences by other people. Some of them are inconveniences based on your time. Some of them are totally out of your control. Some of them are only moderately in your control. 18 factors involved in a workout that all take time.

So did you have an hour to work out plus the 15 to 30 minutes for all the rest of it, depending on what all you got? Or is that the total time you had, you only have an hour to get all that in. Cause if that's the case, you're going to have like a 15 or 20 minute workout. For me, I'm a nerd and it could take me anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half of actual workout time, minimal.

And I can go as long as two hours. I used to be like a two to three hour guy, scaled that back. So do you see the [00:08:00] problem that most people are missing? There are a lot of factors besides that one piece that's on your calendar. I like to use block scheduling on my calendar, and I thought about pulling up my calendar, but I do have some business stuff on there and some personal information that I don't want to share with you guys.

I didn't want to take time to blur all about because it really kind of messes it up for the video. Um, Blah, blah, blah. So I like block scheduling. You can look up what it looks like if you're not familiar with it. I did a whole episode on it and you guys can go check that out. But I like block scheduling because I can physically see it on my calendar.

The actual time it takes. Right. The actual time is, I should say is blocked out for that thing. The fact is most people don't account for all the small steps required for anything you do. That was James Clear's point in atomic habits is most people say, Oh, I'm going to do this to create my habit. This is the new habit, right?

You see all the time for, [00:09:00] uh, new year's resolutions. I'm going to start working out. Okay, great. But this is a person who's never worked out before necessarily they're accounting that one hour and they think they're going to be in the gym for an hour. So that's what they give themselves. They don't account any of those 18 factors we just talked about except for the gym time.

So 17 factors are now missing. We don't contemplate the small little pieces that you have to do because everything you do has a bunch of small steps that takes time That people don't plan on or think about usually when they're putting their schedule together, whether you're stopping for lunch or taking a trip to the grocery store, there are a bunch of little steps that take time.

So if you want to alleviate that stress in your schedule, start looking at all the little pieces and you will have a lot more breathing room. When you stop just putting down the item and start putting the time it takes to accomplish a task down, you [00:10:00] see what I'm scheduling for an interview did three interviews this week when I'm scheduling that time on my calendar, I actually have auto set up there on my scheduling software where people book to be on my show or to record on my show.

And it actually has a built in 15 minute pad on each side of the interview to make sure that nothing can interfere with that time period because I've had interviews run long. I've had interviews run short. I've had other things run long and almost run into an interview. So I now have in a built in minute 15 minute pad on my scheduling for that.

Don't think about the task. I actually analyze the time it takes to complete that task, including all the little steps to get there. This one little fix will actually change the way that you plan your day, the stress involved with it, how successfully you actually complete your plans [00:11:00] because Now you're working on realistic amounts of time and ideas of time.

You're blocking out the time it takes to complete the task, not just putting a task on your calendar. And that will solve a lot of problems and let you track your goals much more realistically. Guys. I hope this helps. It was something I've done for a long time that I didn't even think about consciously because I was raised doing this.

But I see so many people struggling with their schedules and it's because they think of a task instead of the time required to complete the task. And they are different things and they will absolutely knock your calendar askew, especially if you schedule things really, really tight guys, give it a try.

Hope you had a great Halloween yesterday till next time. Be better tomorrow because what you do today, we'll see on the next [00:12:00] one. This has been the fellow man podcast. You're home for everything, man, husband, and father. Be sure to subscribe. So you don't miss a show head over to www. thefallibleman. com for more content and get your own fallible man gear.