I am Dr. Hassan, a Board-Certified Physiatrist and Independent Practice Owner. I help physiatrists start and grow their own profitable practices so they can achieve financial independence and live without limits.
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A recent search for “how to slow down and enjoy life” yielded 432 million results.
Evidently, this is a topic that is on the minds of a lot of people. There is a desire to distance ourselves from the breakneck speed of daily life. Even if you are a workaholic who believes in powering through 16-hour days and always pushing for more effort and more productivity, there are times when you wish you could sit out the rat race and relax for a spell.
We all have our own unique reasons for wanting to slow down. Some people have worked long and hard for several decades. This is the time they feel they should be able to kick back and enjoy their remaining years. Others who long for a less hectic and demanding life are much younger. Yet they still appreciate slowing their racing minds, stepping away from a constantly busy world, and enjoying downtime.
Whatever your reasons for wanting a slower pace in your life, there’s a simple answer. However, it will require that you do something totally radical compared to what the world expects of you. To slow down and enjoy life as much as possible, you must become blind to time.
How Many Times a Day Do You Look at a Clock?
Think about it. How many times in your normal daily routine do you check the time? For many people, it’s the first thing they do daily. Even though they know when their alarm clock went off because they set it the night before, they still look at their clock.
A lot of people use the alarms on their cell phones. Though they know what time their display will show them when the alarm goes off, they check anyway.
Fast-forward to the end of your crazy, busy, hectic day. You are in bed and about to shut off the lights and go to sleep. What’s one of the last things you do? Yep, you check the time.
Our minds are constantly worried about time. What time do you need to be at work? Is it time for lunch yet? How long before you get off of work? Check the time, and you’ll know.
When we’re not working and our time is our own, we check the time even more frequently. You don’t want to miss your favorite reality show, so you’d better check your phone to see what time it is. You’re meeting your friends for lunch, and you don’t want to be late so… check the time.
For several personal and job-related reasons, we are clock watchers all day. How can you truly appreciate your life and what’s happening if you constantly worry about the time?
Shut Your Eyes to Time
Spend some quality time each day, not worried about the passage of time. When you feel the urge to pull out your phone and check the time, don’t. Get outside with mother nature or somewhere else where there aren’t any clocks. Slow down and enjoy life. When you start to divorce yourself from a sense of urgency to know what time it is, you begin to notice what your life is really about.
You can appreciate all aspects of your life, mundane and amazing when you don’t operate under any time constraints. The most efficient way to slow down and truly take part in your existence is to stop measuring time.
Even the most plugged-in and constantly connected person has time in their schedule to throw clock-watching out of the window for a little bit.
Do something you enjoy doing, that thing you do that always causes you to lose sense of time. Spend some time with your friends. Schedule activities without time limits and remind you about the truly important things in life, like smiling, laughing, being happy, and creating great memories.
Constant clock watchers may not realize it, but they are watching their life tick away, second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour. Doesn’t it make more sense to live life and enjoy the experience while you can rather than letting the passage of time dictate everything you do? Create a life where you can be blind to time at least a little bit each day, and you’ll have more time to enjoy your life.
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Once you’ve decided that you want to leave your current job to start your practice, you need an exit plan. Check out our blog post here for tips on developing an exit plan and starting your new independent practice.
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I’m Dr. Hassan, a Board-Certified Physiatrist and Independent Practice Owner. I help physiatrists start and grow their own profitable practices so they can achieve financial independence and live without limits. Please go to businessofrehab.com/contractnegotiations to pick up the free guide to help you negotiate the contract of your dreams.
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