Exactly how long is 1 hour?

Recently, I realized that I had a very poor concept of time.

I wasn't finishing all the things I wanted to.  Time would just seem to "slip" by me during the day (and on weekends in particular).  For the first time in my life, I started catching myself whenever I started saying a variation of these:

"Oh crap! What?  It's ____ o'clock already?"
"I just got really into it and guess I lost track of time."
"Wow, where did the weekend go?"
"This will only take ___ minutes."  [Meanwhile...]
"I forgot about our appointment..."

I am Sorry.

If I have any acquaintances, friends, or family reading this, I deeply apologize for every single time I was late or procrastinated.  This isn't meant to be an apology blog.  As the title states, it's for my own use as I track my self development progress 30 days at a time.

It doesn't stop, however, how I terrible I can feel about about the damage done by this particular bad habit of mine.  Even more troubling to my conscience is that I vividly remember the disappointment in your faces (if face to face) and voices (if over the phone).  They stay with me.  Nothing sucks more than hurting the people you care about and who care about you, inadvertent or not.  I'm working on getting my act together.  I promise you that.

Solution?

Well, not sure exactly.  If I knew I wouldn't be having this problem lol.  All those "time management" books and workshops given in school never seemed to work.

However, a funny thought came to me.  I began thinking about how well I would judge the passing of time without the use of any clocks or devices.  Well, I could probably gauge 5, 10, 15 minutes within reason...but 30 minutes or 1 hour?  I wasn't too sure about that.

So...I've decided to set the my phone alarm clock to go off at the start of every hour (6am - 9pm).

Sound crazy?  Yes.

Will it probably annoy the heck out of everyone around me?  Yes.

But when you want change badly, you've got to try something out of the box.  I'll be testing it to see if it offers any positive change.  At best this will force me to keep checking my phone and hence my calendar, and I'll be able to see how on/off track I am throughout the day.

It's always the same formula, just like learning to ride a bike.

So every day I usually walk the dog around our estate once in the morning and once in the evening.  For the past 2-3 nights, I've spotted this Indian woman in her 50's learning how to ride a bike.  

You could tell she was still learning because it was quite obvious.  For one, she couldn't go 1-2 meters without putting a foot down to catch herself.  Secondly, she had a spotter.  A younger gentleman (her son?) was walking close by her side, helping to catch her if she fell off course.  As I walked the dog along the dimly lit path, I could overhear his whispers of encouragement and advice when we passed by.

"Damn, I'm impressed" I thought to myself. 

Seeing her, I couldn't help but reminisce of when I first learned how to ride a bike.  I think I was 6?  I remember riding with 2 training wheels, gradually reducing it to 1, and then finally riding without any at all.  Man, it seems so long ago.  That was such a fun summer.

The woman doesn't know this, but she inspired me.  I think it takes guts to go out and learn something that society assumes the majority adults already know.

She reminded me that no matter what skill we're after, it's always the same formula just like riding a bike.  It seems difficult at first, but with perseverance and time all will seem effortless.  Any frustration we encounter now is temporary.

Props old lady.