You Don't Want Money. You Want Time.

Why Discretionary Free Time Is The Key To A Meaningful Life

If you spend long enough thinking about health, you will come to a singular realisation:

Regardless of how long you live or how good your physical or cognitive capabilities are, how you spend your time will have the biggest impact on the quality of your life.

This is the domain of soul span.

Soul span is about how you optimise for meaning and purpose in your life.

What use is a long and physically capable life if you do not spend the time you have available to you in a meaningful way?

As I have written about previously, I believe that the meaning of life is to constantly be in the process of moving towards an idealised version of who you really are.

As Carl Jung says:

“The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.”

Most people deep down already know this.

But standing in the way of that process is usually an endless series of responsibilities and tasks we must complete before giving ourselves the time to focus on this task.

But for most people, that list of tasks continually expands, and it can feel we are moving further and further away from that process of ‘becoming who we could be’ rather than toward it.

It is as Henry David Thoreau says:

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”

A desperation driven by that sense of moving away from our highest goals.

And for all too many of us, we find ourselves trudging through life, hoping that if we can get these things done, we can focus on our true path in life.

But time passes.

And before you realise it, decades have passed.

And each day is just the same as the last.

And you are no closer to your goal.

And you know it.

“How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 8:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so? ”

-Charles Bukowski

Regardless of what you think about the lockdowns during COVID, they, more than anything, emphasised that for many of us, we were living a life that Bukowski had described.

And we knew we needed to change.

But how?

The first answer to this question is usually:

“I need more money so I don’t have to work as hard as I do now”.

This can work.

But you need to be mindful of what you will have to ‘pay’ upfront to get that increment of money in your life.

What ‘time’ will you have to give up, and with that sacrifice of time, will you also sacrifice your health?

There is no doubt that having more money would make many of life’s problems easier, but you always have to ask what the tradeoff will be.

And even if you earned more money, would you really change your habits to spend more time on what you truly care about?

Family? Time in nature? Travel? Personal Growth?

In my experience, people who change their lifestyles to make more money often end up with less time for themselves rather than more.

What People Want Most Of All Is Discretionary Free Time.

Discretionary free time is the ability to decide how YOU will spend your time on the things that matter most to you, not someone else deciding.

It’s not that you want just ‘free time’ to do nothing.

What most people want is the autonomy to decide HOW they will spend their time on the things that matter most to them.

For most people, this requires an entire lifestyle redesign.

When I was finishing my training as a cardiologist, I had two choices:

I could continue to work as an interventional cardiologist and make a substantial amount of money doing so, but I would, in my view, lead a life that would seriously impact my ability to spend adequate time with those I love and on the things that mattered most to me.

The other option was to redesign my career as a cardiologist, which was better aligned with how I wanted to work professionally. It would give me more discretionary free time but would mean a very serious reduction of income.

I Chose The Latter.

Because, for me, no amount of money can compensate for not having adequate discretionary free time.

Discretionary free time also allows me to focus on the elements of lifespan and health span.

• Good sleep.

• Regular exercise.

• Good nutrition.

• Less stress.

Without the discretionary free time I have designed into my life, I would not be able to do all of these well enough.

And if I couldn't, my lifespan, health span and soul span would all suffer.

Do not get me wrong—money problems are BIG problems, but always remember why you think you need more money.

In general, it is so that you can have more discretionary free time to do the things that will optimise your lifespan, health span and soul span.

And always remember that none of us is guaranteed tomorrow, so working crazily hard now so you can reap the rewards many decades from now is a very risky strategy.

In order to have discretionary free time, you must always ask:

How can I redesign my life to provide enough discretionary free time and also an income to facilitate it?

The answer will often undoubtedly require significant change.

But ask yourself what it is you truly want and if your current path is really going to get you to where you want to go.

I made a substantial financial sacrifice to give myself the scope to lead a life that allows me to focus on my lifespan, health span and soul span.

It was some of the best money I have ever spent.

Because it wasn’t money that I really wanted.

It was time.

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