Wednesday, 28 September 2005 22:25
Istanbul – The Amazing City
Istanbul is an amazing city. Its traffic and trade is almost indexed to the schools in Istanbul. In summer everyone from car salesman to coach companies awaits the start of the school year. So what happens when schools starts? Well everybody talks about traffic jams until the school holidays. Everybody complains about how a 10 minute drive takes hours thanks to the school buses and students once school starts. Why is it the school buses fault? Are these not the vehicles that carry our precious children to school? I don’t know about you but personally I am grateful for the school bus and its driver that takes my daughter, Aylin, to school everyday. Even if Aylin’s school bus is, not much, just five minutes late, me and my wife forget that its one of the vehicles stuck in traffic and panic thinking she will be left at home.
Its a vicious circle. In the office we complain that we are late because of the school bus, on the other hand when its late to pick our child up we worry. In other words the things that our indespensible suddenly become a burden.
People are nearly as amazing as Istanbul. Isn’t time one of the things we are unable to change? Is there anyone in history who has be able to shorten or lengthen time? Can anyone live anything but 24 hours? Even though everyone knows the answer for the record I am going to tell you: No, a very big no.
One can be done to solve the time issue which is the bain of everyone’s life?
I always aim to provide solutions in my articles so I will no longer keep you in suspense: The solution is both easy and hard. How can that be? I found it hard to understand at first as well.
Anyone who complains that there isn’t enough time in the day, everything is urgent and therefore cannot pu time aside to spend with their family and friends needs to establish their “personal objectives”. Anyone who has not established their life ecpectations is like a leave in the wind. Starting a day without prioritising tasks is the main reason why people complain of tiredness. Self – sacrificing (!) people trying to please their managers, work colleuges, family and friends will get tired every passing day as well as lose forget their expectations of life.
There are plenty of books, articles, learning programmes...etc that help you in setting your objectives and expectations. For further information go http://www.amazon.com
which also has plenty of materials translated into Turkish.
However for those interested I will outline the basics in setting your objectives:
1.) Establish your expectation from life,
2.) Once you establish your expectation question whether it is exactly what you want
3.) Make a list of ten things, in order of importance, that you need to do in order to achieve your expectation.State a date for each item. When writing your items state yourself as the subject, use the futur tense and do not use any words that suggest negativity. For example instead of “Do not be late for work” write “I will go to work on time”, or instead of “We must finish the project” use “ I will finish the project by ......” This rule is crucial for your subconcious interepretation as it will accept the fact that you will execute the stated in the give time.
4.) Before you go to bed every night rewrite your objectives on ablank piece of paper. Do not look at the objectives you wrote for the previous day as your priorities may change day to day. It is important to write your objectives before you go to bed as your subconcious works while you sleep.
5.) One the dates for the objectives have been established the only thing left is to deliver. The most important thing is that th timing is sufficient and correct. Om people call this time management. How can you manage a 24 hour day? Is it not individual management rather than time management? I seem to hear you say “Yes, that’s true”.
In order for the person to manage themselves they need to be aware of and take onboard their responsibilities. Somebody who approaches the situation with a “I can do this” attitute is bound to succeed in managing their time. When I first heard this I thought it would be hard to carry out however, as I said if you take the right approach its easy managing tasks and time in order of importance and urgency.
The common mistake is the distinction between importance and priority. If you do not wish to fall into the trap of thinking everything is urgent you need to categorise the tasks to hand:
1.) Important and urgent
2.) Important but not urgent
3.) Not important but urgent
4.) Not important or urgent
Having completed the categorisation the section that requires the most attention is “important but nit urgent” as this category contains future projects, training programmes, resourcing, reading, resting and spending time with your family. The items in the third category make up the things that are required to achieve your objectives. With time these lose importance due to the urgent and important things and you end up blaming a school bus for being late.
3.) Not important but urgent
4.) Not important or urgent
Having completed the categorisation the section that requires the most attention is “important but nit urgent” as this category contains future projects, training programmes, resourcing, reading, resting and spending time with your family. The items in the third category make up the things that are required to achieve your objectives. With time these lose importance due to the urgent and important things and you end up blaming a school bus for being late.
For people who wish to stop blaming the traffic for their latest I suggest you start your list immediately. For those of you who are asking “I live in Istanbul, what’s my situation?” I have even better news, this solution is valid worldwide and its free, its effectiveness depends on how much you believe in it and how well you execute it. Infact this solution is not only valid for individuals but for companies and governments as well. A specific example is Japan. After the Second World War, having lost most of its population and with the lack of natural resources the Japanese government constructed 10 year plans. Thanks to the plans established in 1950,1960,1970 and 1980 Japan is now a world leader in the following industries: textiles, iron and steel, cars and electronical goods.
As Napoleon once said the fate of a war is established in five minutes. If you are prepared you can make a difference in those five minutes and live the victory, those who are defeated will create nw excuses.
