“I don’t have time.”
or maybe “I didn’t have time.”
I hear this a lot. I’ve had occasion myself sometimes to say those same things.
But it’s often (though not always) BS.
When we say we’re too busy to do something, or that we haven’t had the time to do something, what is actually going on is often something quite different.
Take for example YouTube videos.
Imagine you’ve decided that they’re not applicable to your business. You might have good reason. You might have done testing and determined that your target market doesn’t watch such videos. Or perhaps the videos are being watched – but they never turn into leads – even after you’ve worked hard to improve them.
That’s ok. At least your decision-making is based on the best thing, testing.
But what if you’ve decided against doing YouTube videos because you don’t have time – because you’re too busy.
That’s BS on 2 fronts.
Firstly, what you’re actually saying is that it’s simply not important enough to you. We all have time constraints. None of us can do everything.
What’s more accurate and more honest is that we’re simply not prioritising the “thing”.
Secondly, people often overestimate the effort in doing something. Is this deliberate?
For one of my recent videos, I stopped during a lunchtime walk.
I stood by the river. I recorded the video in one unscripted take. 2 minutes.
Back at the office it took 5 minutes max to get it off the phone and uploaded to YouTube.
No biggie.
Not to be overstated or dramatised.
We can’t be successful if we’re bullshitting ourselves – let alone others.
Yes – we need to work smart. But we also need to hustle.
So I’ll leave you with two questions:
Are you working hard?
Are you working on the right priorities?
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