Self-made millionaire H. Reardon shares in his book ‘Time Management 2.0: 15 Secrets of a Self-Made Millionaire for Getting Things Done’ –  “If you want a life changing tool, just print out a big “1440” on a piece of paper and tape it on your office door, or under your TV, or next to your computer monitor.”

1440: The number of minutes in each day.

Widely celebrated as “the millionaire maker,” Dan Kennedy has a long record of taking entrepreneurs to seven-figure incomes. His take on time? “Time’s never far from my mind in my work-cave because I have strategically placed more than a dozen clocks around the room and can’t look in any direction without seeing one. Because last year’s bank balance and your satisfaction or dissatisfaction with it is more a reflection of how you invest your time than of anything else. In reality, time is one of the few assets the entrepreneur owns outright and has total control over.”

What is your own philosophy about time?

You can NEVER make more time. No matter how hard you try. Once the day is gone it’s gone. You will NEVER get it back. Dan says that it is one of the few assets that we have control over yet what do we do with it? We squander time. Watch it go by. Talk about stuff we want to accomplish, but daily do nothing about it. I am not scolding anyone here. I have watched myself go from Facebook to checking emails, to reading something on line, and right back to Facebook – all this “busy” activity, none of which are taking me any closer to my goals. Why do we sabotage ourselves like that?

Mr. Reardon says that he used to hang a 1440 sign on the outside of his office door and two things happened. First, he was reminded of the VALUE of time (tick tick tick!) EVERY TIME he walked through his door. And second: it was a great conversation piece. When employees knocked and asked, “You got a minute?” they would inevitably ask him about the 1440 and IMMEDIATELY have their own heightened sense of time and the value he placed on it. His meetings suddenly got shorter.

Like me, you may have already known the number 1440. I sure did. It’s like the GEICO ads where one person says “you know…15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance.” And the other person replies “EVERYBODY knows THAT.” We all might know that there are 1440 minutes in a day but does knowing this bring about a sense of urgency?

I started writing the number 1440 at the top of my journal page EVERY morning. Because I’m writing it down, I’m much more aware of what I’m doing with my minutes as I remind myself – there is no ROLL OVER plan for minutes not used on a given day. Used or not, one thing’s for sure – the minutes WILL tick by.

Reardon assures us, “When you truly FEEL the passage of time, your worldview changes. When you wake up and subconsciously start the countdown 1440, 1439, 1428…procrastination tends to melt away and productivity increases.”

What’s your philosophy about time?

Think about money. How much attention do you give to money? You’re working to MAKE money, thinking of ways to make MORE money, and ensuring that no one STEALS what you DO have from you. You’d never be so careless with your money as to leave your wallet or purse unattended or give your ATM card along with your password to perfect strangers. Yet we allow people to STEAL our time.

What’s your philosophy about time?

Dan Kennedy shares “One of my philosophies about time management relates to commitments. If somebody can’t keep seemingly minor commitments, they can’t be trusted to honour important ones, either. If they are allowed to hang around, soon they’ll cause you to fail to honour your own commitments.”

I’m choosing to hold a different view around time. Now I ask “Will this use of my time move me measurably closer to my meaningful goals? Is there even a chance it will? If not, why am I choosing to do “THIS” instead of working on achieving my goals?”

Many of us love using the phrase “time is money” but do you actually handle time as money? Can you tell me what your time must be worth per minute to achieve your income goals?

Have you ever been to a casino? Interesting fact: casinos don’t have clocks. Why? Because casinos are designed to separate you from as much of your money as possible -to make you a loser – and that is best done by dulling your sensitivity to the passing of time. The same principle applies to your business and life. The surest way to be a loser is to be casual or insensitive about time.

Dan makes a valid point “I’ve spent 35 years with entrepreneurs, many of whom have converted ideas and grit into fortunes, but many more who never accomplish that alchemy. The difference is never the quality of their ideas. As a matter of fact, I’ve see fortunes manufactured from mediocre ideas and great ideas stillborn. It boils down to time philosophy. This is important because far too many entrepreneurs and those who observe them, write about them, glorify their success stories and hold up THE GREAT IDEA as some pedestal-worthy holy grail – are missing the point. That is worship of a false god. Hardly anybody gets paid for their ideas. Not even the Imagineers at Disney. We actually get paid for WHAT WE GET DONE.”

If you want to succeed you have to set yourself up for success. Create a successful environment for yourself. Impose strict deadlines on yourself, be ruthlessly resistant to time-wasting [your own and when others waste your time], hold yourself accountable hour by hour. If you aren’t willing to work under such self-imposed pressure, then do yourself a favour and don’t lie to yourself. Don’t say “I can’t make a success out of my business or life,” say instead “I CHOOSE not to make a success of my business and/or life.”