I am Always Late

No matter who you are, a student or the President of the United States, a Hollywood star or a housewife: developing good habits is something that will always pay you back with positive changes and success in your life. Actually, what we need for a successful life can be put to the following 15 essential habits. Certainly, I can’t guarantee that if you practice all these habits and behaviors, you’ll automatically become happier or more successful in you life, but your chances will greatly increase, I promise you!

1. Learn to plan your daily activities. Our mind and our body expect a cyclic routine, that is why we go to sleep and eat approximately at the same time every day. Learn to create and get used to a certain structured plans in your life.

2. Manage your time and financial resources wisely. Remember that our time is the most valuable asset, and the money we earn open the ways to live a comfortable, healthy and happy life.

3. Always do plenty of physical exercises and outdoor activities. Only an active lifestyle is a way to good health and happy life.

4. Follow a healthy nutrition plan. Unfortunately, the majority of the foods we have in our markets and grocery stores are not healthy, therefore everyone needs to be concerned about what he or she eats. In conjunction with lots of physical activities, a healthy diet as a key factor for effective weight management, a good health and a happy life.

5. Take a good care about your body and health. Observe the common rules of persona hygiene, brush and floss your teeth twice a day, shape your image and your appearance.

6. Learn something new, read and study on a daily basis. Being a lifelong learner is a great advantage, not only for your mental health, but for your social status as well.

7. Try to be always punctual and never be late.

8. Avoid telling lies. Sooner or later, the truth is revealed, so why to dirty your name and reputation with lies? Tell the truth, this will make you be more sincere and opened to other people, and your life will be easier.

9. Be opened and tell others what you want. Always make it clear to other people, what way is preferable for you, and you’ll achieve what you want in an easier way.

10. Be always polite and grateful. Showing people that you appreciate their attitude and time is extremely important.

11. Respect the elderly and authority. This is a key rule for successful social life.

12. Listen to your spiritual needs and signs. Rely on your inner calls and your intuition, because this is the way that higher powers are trying to let you know about possible changes in your life.

13. Always strive for better. Do not stop and enjoy your current situation in life for a long period of time. Know that you can do and achieve more, and try to find new ways to get higher.

14. Never give up. No matter how hard a situation on your life has become, go on being pushy and strong, and you’ll get paid for that.

15. Take care about the environment. This is one of the most important habits that today’s parent must teach children, otherwise our planet has no future…

I think, there is hardly a person in the world who is not familiar with the following situation. Early morning, your alarm clock is ringing, you wake up and the first thought that comes to your mind is something like this: “Oh, no! It was such a great dream that I was seeing… I’ll stay in bed just two minutes more, nothing is going to change for just two minutes…”

Or, there’s another typical situation. You are watching your favorite Martha Stewart or Ellen DeGeneres Show. You look at your clock and see that it is time for you to start getting ready for going out for a meeting, for a lecture or for a party, but you enjoy watching the show so much and can’t find motivation to give up watching. This is a typical fight between the things we have to do and the things we truly enjoy doing, and it’s a habit of many typical latecomers to make a choice rather for the things they enjoy doing.

On the other hand, this fight does not have to be between the things we like and dislike doing. Sometimes such issues as obligation, duty, or even our instincts can come about. For example, some women can be late because they got set up for cleaning the apartment and do not want to be interrupted by anything else until the work is done. Or some bosses who tend to stay in the office long after working hours and go on working on one or another projects together with their subordinates. These people can’t stop their activities in the midstream because house cleaning or work supervising are really important things that should be done.

Therefore, those chronic latecomers who tend to listen to their impulses and mostly go in for what they enjoy or are obliged to do should learn interrupt their impulses. Sometimes it is connected with being more disciplined, sometimes it is connected with training their willpower. If you are the one who can’t stop doing the things you enjoy, the way to train your willpower can be practicing stopping your favorite entertaining or relaxing activities for a short while in order for your brain to get used to the idea of the interruption. Doing this everyday can help you be more focused on the things you have to do instead of doing what you like doing.

Those folks who are always late know so well that there are many reasons of chronic lateness and tardiness. Most of them take source of our daily lifestyle and habits, some originate from our time management problems and laziness, and some should be looked for in the deepness of our personality. Many latecomers have personal problems, like too low self-esteem, wrong self-perception or a  lack of self-control.

Many chronic latecomers, especially women, suffer from the problems of being always late due to their hyper-excitability. For example, it is a very typical situation when a young lady of our times is getting late to work, meetings or even parties as she gets excited and spends hours for choosing a good bag, or skirt, or shoes. Excessive excitement and anxiety does not give her an opportunity to keep her thoughts together and control her time.

Such syndromes as excessive excitement and anxiety are always followed by strong urges to alleviate them through, for instance, the desire of looking perfect, or being somehow different from other people. Such strong attacks of excitement or fears not to be perfect or at least good, always divert people’s attention and not let them focus on another, not less important issue: being on time.

It is essential to learn how to handle your excessive excitement and anxiety. The first important step is being able to recognize the moment when your anxiety started interfering with your efforts on being on time. As soon as you have noticed that you are getting more and more anxious about the way you look or the way you are supposed to be, you should be able to interrupt this tendency immediately.

The second step is learning how to effectively alleviate your excitement, calm down and being focused on the time again. You can use such technique as a self-talk, or deep breathing, or counting to twenty. For the time you are counting, you can understand that your calls to choose new dress were to a certain degree absurd, and your attempts to be more than perfect were only taking your time. Try to get concentrated on the things you are going to do at the party or at the meeting, and persuade yourself that your only goal now is not to be late again.

In many cases, chronic lateness develops from inability of a person to stay focused and being ready to becoming more organized. That is why such person is always late, forgets keys and files, forgets to return calls and arrive at meetings, confuses the dates of the appointments and so on. If you are one of those who have problems focusing and keeping tings in mind, here are a few useful tips for you.

• At work, try to keep all your papers in special files with separators. Also, have a special file for all the papers which should be reviewed or corrected. Make a habit of tidying up your table before leaving office every evening.
• At home, try to organize everything and keep everything you use frequently in the same fixed places: your keys, your glasses, your documents and your remote control.
• Keep the things you are using frequently and those things which you do not use frequently in separated places. This way you will save your time for looking for something when you are in a  hurry.
• Make a habit of getting ready for tomorrow’s meeting or appointment in the evening. Gather the things you’ll need and prepare your suit or dress.
• Always keep spare keys or gasses at a place you know for the case if you happened to lose those.
• Make your cellular phone be your companion, this way you will always be able to access Internet, use GPRS system in order not to get lost and call you friends for a help.
• Create a print out several copies of a list of the phone numbers and addresses of your friends, colleagues and emergency services.
• Always be aware about what time is it now and how much time have you spent for doing one or another activity during the day.

My mom is not a latecomer, but she has one of the most dangerous predispositions to this problem. She is an extreme workaholic and there’s nothing she hates more than “wasting” her time for waiting in a queue in the market or at the bus stop. She is very rarely late because she is very good about estimating how much time she needs for doing this or that. But those people, who are usually too optimistic about their time can’t avoid becoming chronic latecomers.

Such kind of people often fall into the same trap again and again. If once upon a time it took them, for example, 5 or 10 minutes to get ready for going out, they start believing that it is normal to plan only 5 minutes for getting ready to go out at any circumstances. But they are forgetting that in that fine day the breakfast was ready, the dress was prepared in the evening and there was no need in looking for winter bots or umbrella.

How to beat the lateness caused by inability to do correct time estimations and desire to pack as many activities as possible in the time given? I would suggest trying to get rid of these two problems separately and consequently. First, try to learn being realistic in your time estimations. Use watches and timers, and measure the time you need to accomplish one or another task or activity. Write down your findings and compare them to the ones you received before: this way you’ll know how much time you need for the things you do every day.

Also, pay more attention on scheduling your daily activities and doing only the things that should be or would better be done. Spending your time for unnecessary or unimportant things – this is a real wasting of your priceless time. By the way, if you hate spending time waiting for someone and that’s why you are never on time, plan some useful things to do while waiting. Make calls to your friends, do some planning or write letters, listen to audio books or learn a foreign language. How many useful and interesting activities can be done while waiting for someone!

Finally, you should give up the idea of being on time and always plan to be a little earlier. If you plan to be on time, something will definitely come up in the last minute, and the same old thing will happen again. Instead, you can schedule some things or activities, which are not urgent or of less importance, so if you really happened to have time before going out, you can do these things. Try to change your attitude towards your time and the time other people spend waiting for you, and you’ll be able to become more punctual and earn more respect of your friends and colleagues.

Not many people are always punctual at work. On average, business people are running behind their schedules for 3-10 minutes, but still they are considered to be quite punctual. Being always late or unable to complete your tasks on time creates a lot of pressure and causes a great number of stresses at work. Therefore, below you can find easy recommendations for those who want to change their approach and be more punctual.

1. Try to find out what exactly causes your tardiness. Why do you leave your house late every morning? Why are you always late with your projects and tasks? Maybe, those are unnecessary drives and urges you can’t resist? Or can it be your habit to stay in bed till the last moment? Monitor you daily activities closely and try to spot 2-4 things that cause you running behind the schedule again and again.

2. Change your attitude. Accept your tardiness as a bad habit that you need to get rid of and get ready for making changes in your behavior. Understand the reasons and get motivated for a hard work on self-disciplining. Start thinking in a rational manner and avoid impulsive actions.

3. Think about the risks connected with your being late and tardy. Understand that the consequences of your tardiness can be really negative and disappointing. Your reputation in the eyes of your colleagues and bosses will not be high, and this can seriously lower your chances of promotion and advancement. Also, the tasks and projects you are involved in will be associated with stresses and late delivery. What to say about possible disciplinary actions and low self-esteem.

4. Learn to plan and prioritize your activities. Planning is something that can help you to become more organized. Also, you should learn to understand, what must be done right away, what is important and has to be done soon, and what should not be done at all. Plan and schedule your tasks and actions even if your day is not too busy. This way you’ll turn planning and scheduling into a habit.

5. Think about the responsibility. Being punctual is closely linked to respect to the time and efforts of other people, to being more responsible and successful, to self-development and personal improvement day by day. Remember that punctuality will bring you excellent reward, today and tomorrow.

Punctuality is something that has been highly valued and esteemed for centuries. “Better three hours too soon than a minute too late,” Shakespeare wrote, and Lord Nelson opens his secret to us, “I owe all my success in life to having been always a quarter of an hour before my time.” “Punctuality is a virtue, if you don’t mind being lonely”, somebody wise said, and in our life filled with communication, social activities, friendly ties and obligations, punctuality is simply a must!

Since our early age, we are being taught punctuality by our parents, our teachers and our friends. It becomes apparent that if we do not follow this simple practice of being always on time and never making other people wait for us, we will most likely have problems and suffer in our academic, professional, social and personal life. It is impossible to cover up and hide this nasty habit of being always late from the people around us since they will sooner or later be involved in the negative consequences caused by our tardiness and lack of punctuality.

Usually, punctuality is strictly linked to very effective planning and scheduling skills. If a person is not able to estimate correctly the time necessary for completing one or another task or action, he or she will be constantly late and have to face such failures as missed opportunities, lost friendships and unachieved goals. In other words, if you are not punctual, you are a loser, and the best idea is to demonstrate punctuality in every part of your life, from getting to work on time to going to bed on time.

However, it is really hard sometimes, and chronic latecomers are constantly looking for advice on how to change their life and their attitude. To be more punctual, start controlling your daily activities an find the point, when you are starting to run behind the schedule. This can be getting up late and staring the day with missing your bus and arriving to work late, or waking up too eary and being unable to pull yourself together for hours in the morning. Try to spot the first thing that makes you late, and changing it can help you to become more disciplined and punctual.

Also, analyze your daily activities closely and find out what exact things or actions make you run late. There are good chances that you will be able to find 2-3 particular activities or occupations that take too much of your time and efforts and stop you from your being on time. Spending too much time surfing in the net in the morning, talking too much to the phone in the afternoon or doing so much shopping in the evening – whatever it is, you can start changing this very thing and open a new path on your way to being never late again.

As I have told you before, I know quite a lot of things about being late and being late no more because just few years ago I myself was a kind of latecomer. And, using my knowledge and willpower I managed to beat the habit and win the battle. Now, I rarely run behind the schedules, but still sometimes I feel familiar calls for lazing and doing nothing for long time. I guess, being late no more is not about self-discipline or self-respect. It is about achieving your goals. It is about the things that you need to think about all the time, every day and every minute. If you want to achieve something in this life, of course.

There are few important ideas and conclusions I made on my way to becoming a more punctual person. I hope at least some of them can help you to change something in yourself, or at least begin thinking about being late no more.

1. Learn to speak persuasively and prepare several phrases which can help you to interrupt a meeting or a talk. “I am very sorry but I have to our talk because I have a meeting in 20 minutes”. It is not easy to learn doing this, but making your person understand that you are following your schedule evokes nothing else but respect.

2. Always be pessimistic in your time estimations. Be sure that one or another task will take longer than it usually takes. This will help you learn finishing your tasks and assignments on time, and probably even come earlier. Also, it is important that this will help you be calmer and more organized.

3. You can stimulate the development of guilt complex for your being late. Imagine that a person who is waiting for us feels cold or hot and uncomfortable waiting for you.

4. If you are always successful in justifying yourself for your chronic lateness, it can be very hard for you to change your habits and learn to be late never again. Do not look for justifications and try to implant the idea in your mind about changing your attitude and learning to be more organized and disciplined.

5. Do easy exercises for those who want to be late no more. First of all, learn to estimate and feel the time correctly. Get a timer, start it and begin counting 60 seconds (not looking at the timer). Compare the results you received (most likely your 60 seconds will last longer than actual minute). Besides, you can train yourself to be always aware, what is the current time. These easy exercises will help you to feel time better and value it.

Do you know that our good-old excuses are the worst enemies on the way to self-discipline and effectiveness? We always say to ourselves “I have no time for this now”, or “It is not the time for this”, or “It is a worthless waste of time”, or “I have no money for this now”, etc. The main idea of all these excuses is doing nothing. In other words, these excuses help us to justify our laziness and inertness. It seems that there’s nothing new in what I am saying now, but give it a thought: how many times a day you use these excuses…

For example, you want to start doing exercises every day and give yourself a word to get up 30 minutes earlier in the morning and exercise. In your mind, you start picturing how your body is becoming more fit and stronger, and you are set up for positive results and new exciting changes in your life. However, when the alarm rings in the morning, you start thinking: “No, why so early? I’ll stay in the bed for just 5 more minutes, it is so warm here.. Well, I’d better exercise in the evening…” And, when you come back home in the evening after hard working day, what kind of exercise can you think about? Especially when it is your favorite show on the TV…

This goes on and on day by day. Every time you have some important problems to solve and things to do which will distract you from making important steps on the way to your goals. We repeat to ourselves that “we have no time for this now”, and in many situations, this way we avoid positive changes. Sometimes we get really used to all these bad things in our life and we are not trying to do anything to change our life for better. I know a lot of such people who go on complaining about their life, but when I offer several solutions for their problems, they just say that they do not have time for that. Therefore, they avoid the things that can change their life for better.

This way, our excuses make us give up solving our problems, that leads to personal degradation, depression, psychological disorders and so on. Our problems multiply and turn into real troubles. What to do? How to get out of this circle? You should look for power in yourself. If you really want to change something in your life, you can always do that. You will destroy your obstacles and achieve your goals no matter what. Do not think that tomorrow (the next week or the next month) you will have more time and opportunities to solve your problem. It is only one of those good-old excuses. What can hold you from making at least a little step to solving your problem right now?

Do those little steps and fight against your laziness, your apathy, uncertainty, fears and hesitations. It is always easier to postpone and procrastinate, but your problem will not be solved this way. When we are trying to solve our problems and overcome obstacles, we develop and progress. If you have a problem, you always have power and means for solving it. When you overcome the obstacle and solve your problem, you are becoming stronger and more powerful. The obstacles we overcome give us power! Remember this all the time, remember that you are a strong person and remember that there is always the way out!

Procrastination is a serious problem of many modern people, which actually goes several hundred years back and was troubling humanity centuries ago. St. Augustine, a Father of Latin church, who lived and worked in the IVth century, spent years in studying the issues related to procrastination. This concept helped St. Augustine to fight against his physical and mental temptations, that is why he was looking at positive sides of procrastination. Another famous scientist, Leonardo da Vinci,  was also a victim of this negative behavioral model. Due to his chronic delaying, lots of his paintings and bright technological ideas were left half-done. Mark Antonius, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Douglas Adams, Agatha Cristie and many more of famous successful people were chronic procrastinators as well.

Why do we always start a new life or a cholesterol lowering diet tomorrow, not today? Why our kitchen should be cleaned right before important exams? Why we have a tendency to check out our e-mail messages every morning instead of coming straight to work? Why do we go on putting the things off even knowing about negative consequences of procrastination? A scientist from Canada Piers Steel, as associate Professor of industrial psychology at Haskayne School of Business (University of Calgary), studied these issues for more than 10 years, and his research ended up with creating a new concept called the Temporal Motivation Theory, publishing a wonderful book and a series of articles in the journal of the American Psychological Association.

“The heart of procrastination“, the specialist says, ” is an adaptive natural tendency to value today much more than tomorrow“. It is interesting that Steel decided to use a complex mathematical approach to the problem of putting things off and attempted to create a formula, which would define procrastination. The specialist claims that chronic delaying can be expressed by the following Procrastination Equation: U=EV/ID, where U is our desire to complete a certain task (or our drive to delay the completion). At that, E is expectancy to succeed at the task, V is the value of the completed task, I is the degree if urgency of the task and, finally, D is our individual sensitivity to delay.

After studying the subject both from theoretical and practical perspectives, Steel offers several innovative explanations of procrastination as a social phenomenon. The expert is convinced that the majority of today’s procrastinators (which, according to Steel, account up to 5% of today’s population) are not just lazy people who want to avoid doing the things they do not want to do. He says that such factors as our natural impulsiveness, a lack of self-knowledge or self-confidence,  an absence of strong motivation and our natural desire to see immediate results are among the main factors that contribute in development of this bad habit. The Temporal Motivation Theory, the procrastination equation and the study in general received positive reaction of many management specialists, who found it applicable to modern business leadership practices.