It is not only acceptable, but required for you to make deposits into your self improvement bank. This is not a selfish act, nor is it really “personal time.” Let me pause there for a minute. Who came up with this notion of labeling things that you do outside of your work as “personal time” anyway? As if any time I spend is anything other than personal. All my time is my own, and I am choosing to spend some of that personal time in trade for compensation. There is no other sane way to look at it. I owe no obligation to anyone for my time unless I negotiate an agreement for some compensation for that time, or I am willing and with my own decision giving it away. For example, there are plenty of times when I am absolutely willing to share my personal time with my loved ones. That I am 100% willing to do, but any other request for my personal time, for any reason, needs to be treated as a barter.
So when you are staring down a day full of work, think on this for a minute. Are you choosing to spend some of your personal time (because all time is personal) on investing in yourself? It is important to look at your self improvement as a savings account if you will. When you were young, you spend a lot of time investing in self improvement. School, learning on your first few jobs, etc. As you get older you start to take major withdrawals from that investment. Here is the problem, if you do not continue to make investments in your self improvement, you will run out and then you will wake up one day being obsolete and nothing left in the tank. I have seen this over and over again. When I taught college, there were many people in their middle years, going back to college to learn a new skill. They had forgot to make investments in themselves and as a consequence were really far in debt. It was going to take a lot to recover.
So as you think about where to spend time today, where to spend your personal time. You need to donate your personal time to your friends and family. You might want to spend some of that personal time in just a wasted activity so that you can relax. You are probably going to spend some personal time in trade for compensation that you need. However, ask yourself this question. Where are you spending personal time investing in your future? You need to make some deposits on a regular basis or you are going to have a serious problem at some point in your future.
Guy Reams
