Why you should spend money to save time, for people. -

You can always make more money, but you can’t get time back – once it’s spent, it’s gone.

Would you rather spend the money to pay for something that can be done in less time than you’d do it yourself in?. And the time and energy that you saved, you could spend it more purposefully and productively.

Time is money!

For example, during autumn and winter, I take my freshly washed laundry to the laundromat to dry – it only takes 5 minutes to drive there, and 24 minutes to dry, costing a mere $3 vs the whole day to half dry in the sun.

Have I thought of installing my own dryer? Not at all, because I wouldn’t be able to buy one big and powerful enough to dry all my laundry in one load! Besides I’d imagine the power bill would be gigantic!

Laziness is good if you learn to be efficient!

In times like these, “laziness” or ways to find shortcuts does really pay off! The other day I had to convert around 20 google response form responses into a readable word doc.

Google it!

Fortunately I just googled and found some free software that did the converting – voila! And the job was done in an hour instead of spending my precious hours and energy manually copying and pasting!

Time is precious – every second that goes, is every second spent and we’re not going to get it back. As I get older every year, I appreciate time now more than ever before. Money can always be made and re-made, but not time.

Are we in control of our tomorrow?

However if you have time, you have time to figure out how to make more money or whatever it is that you want to achieve. Remember, we’re not in control of tomorrow either, who can guarantee how much longer you’ll be alive?

The best investment of time is to put it into people including our loved ones. Because people, much like time, is a ‘non-renewable resource’. Children grow up, family and friends move away, people get sick and die. Morbid, but true.

Investing time into people is way better.

“People” also includes you. So, how are you investing or not investing into people? Is it because you simply ‘don’t have time’? Then think about ways to make time – by trading money for time.

Trade money for time? Yep! Absolutely. Why do most of us dream of having a passive income or to “make lots of money”? It’s because we want to trade renewable money for un-renewable time. I’m a big fan of this concept, and this is what I aim to do, while doing what I love.

So how do you even begin to make this trade-off? You start off by prioritising intentionally how you can spend your time prudently and wisely. Then you set goals on how to get there. And maybe, you need to spend that money in order to get that time for what’s MORE important.

Do you feel guilty for paying for things you could do yourself?

Your first thought is: ‘I could save that money and do it myself’. Yes, you can, but then you’d use up that time for doing tasks while you’d miss out on time with people. Tasks vs people – what should you spend your spare time on?

After a long day at work or in your business, you’re tired and maybe stressed. And you have family at home who are waiting to see you and spend time with you. So are you going to spend those precious few spare hours doing chores or would you rather spend this time with your loved ones?

Kids grow up fast. I blinked my eyes and now my two babies are teenagers – where’d all the time go? Sometimes I admit I don’t intentionally spend time with them, cos it’s just easier to work or not engage in conversations! But I choose to allocate time for my husband and children.

Unless we live by ourselves, and only care about ourselves, it’s essential we intentionally connect and engage with our family and spouses. We’ve allowed the internet to eat up all our social interaction time – everyone’s on their screens and no-ones paying attention to anyone else.

It’s definitely a problem today. Many marriages and families break apart simply because one or both of the spouses or parents are simply too tied up in their own world, busy working, out seeing other people or doing household ‘stuff.

If you intentionally prioritize time with your family, then you wouldn’t feel guilty for spending money to get things done. You’ve traded it for the freedom to invest precious time for your beloved family. It’s a trade off you”ll never regret.

Are you a busy working professional or working parent?

Then your time is precious and expensive, and so is anyone’s time that is spent investing into people like pastors, leaders and entrepreneurs. If you have the earning capacity and you’re paid well for what you do, then you can afford to pay for tasks that others can do. It’s often cheaper than your own hourly rate and you free up your own time for what’s more important.

Here are some ways at home, that you can save time, by paying to get things done:

Housework – cleaning and laundry – pay professionals or your kids!
Pre ordering pre prepared meals so all you do is cook the ingredients
Delegate household chores and cooking to your older children
Paying all your bills online, or set up automatic payments to pay them
Ordering your groceries online and getting them delivered
Take you car through a 5 minute car wash or pay your kids to wash & clean your car/s.
Online shop for clothing, shoes, & other things you need
Pay for your lawns to be mowed, and gardens tydied up.
Stock up on meat in the freezer and other long term freezable items so that you don’t have to buy it every week.

7 questions to find out why you should spend money to save time:

Ok, so you’re still weighing up whether you should spend more money on time saving tasks? Here, you can ask yourself these questions to find simple ways you can begin to trade money for time: