Ego attempting to schedule, organize, and otherwise control the Tao. Man proposes, but the Tao disposes.
Scheduling and planning are strategic activities we engage in within the present, but with an awareness that future developments may overwrite our plans. It is not our job to prestructure the future.
Time management teaches you to juggle more balls, and the reward for that is to be given still more balls. Stephan Rechtschaffen’s work on timeshifting compensates for the one-sidedness of time management. It helps you to find time for valuable, non-urgent activities or unstructured being time. If your time is already overbooked, before you agree to a new obligation, consider what you will stop doing to make space for the new commitment. Taking Stephen’s seminar at the Omega Institute was life-shifting. Listen to him discussing his concept of timeshifting in this podcast and consider reading his book, Time Shifting: Creating More Time to Enjoy Your Life.
Soil with a lot of manure in it produces abundant crops; water that is too clear has no fish. Therefore, enlightened people should maintain the capacity to accept impurities and should not be solitary perfectionists.
— Huanchu Daoren (16th Century Taoist)
See:
Temporal Fencing and Life Fields
Kill the Time Grid and Fire up your Life
Clock Time Metastasizes Toward 2012