{"id":4891,"date":"2017-04-06T08:29:33","date_gmt":"2017-04-06T08:29:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/?p=4891"},"modified":"2025-02-13T11:30:27","modified_gmt":"2025-02-13T11:30:27","slug":"timesink-watching-tv-email","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/blog\/timesink-watching-tv-email\/","title":{"rendered":"The Time Sink of Television and Email"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/h2>\n

Is Watching Television Still High in Trend?<\/h2>\n

The exact numbers differ with ethnicity, and increase with age, but, if you are between the ages of 18 and 35, you probably spend an average of 25 hours a week watching television<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s a part time job. <\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

As for emails, the McKinsey Institute found that 28% of an employee\u2019s workweek is spent reading and responding to emails<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though this is limited to work hours, I personally know that many corporate employees will be bothered (and pressured to read and respond to) by emails in their off-hours. Furthermore, it\u2019s unlikely this habit dies once someone is in \u201cfree time\u201d mode. <\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve covered many different time management practices. Whether it\u2019s the power of \u201cdoing nothing\u201d or the 100-hour work week and Gary Vaynerchuk\u2019s plea for everyone to stop complaining about not having time, the goal of these advocacies and the goal of an application like FocusMe is very, very simple \u2013 spend more time doing what you love.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

That means spend less<\/i> time doing what distracts you from what you love. <\/span><\/p>\n

Twenty-four hours in a day. Pope or pauper, you all have the same amount of time. If nearly a second full-time job a week is spent on television and emails (if you add the times together), does the excuse of \u201cI don\u2019t have the time to do X\u201d still hold true?<\/span><\/p>\n

Let’s Face the Numbers<\/h2>\n

No, it doesn\u2019t. Let\u2019s do some quick math. <\/span><\/p>\n

Full-time works clock an average of 47 hours a week<\/span><\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s then add in 8 hours of sleep a week, to be ideal (for those who complain about not getting sleep). 56 hours.<\/b> <\/span><\/p>\n

Add to that 2 hours a day of preparing\/eating meals. 14 hours a week.<\/span><\/a> <\/span><\/p>\n

Oh, and don\u2019t forget laundry\/grocery shopping. ~2 hours a week.<\/span><\/a> <\/span><\/p>\n

With a week, comprising of 168 hours, that leaves us with <\/span>49 hours of free time<\/b><\/span>, roughly. <\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re spending close to thirty hours a week watching television, you can see under the cold hard truth of math that you do have the time. You just don\u2019t spend it very well. <\/span><\/p>\n

Yet another article criticizing the false notion that you don\u2019t have time. <\/span><\/p>\n

Don\u2019t like that you have to spend 47 hours a week working? Well, that\u2019s another article in and of itself. For now, let\u2019s work on giving you more time with the life you\u2019re currently living. <\/span><\/p>\n

We need to kill the bad habit. You spend too much time watching television and reading emails. If you\u2019re one of the few who don\u2019t, then don\u2019t read this article.<\/span><\/p>\n

To kill a bad habit, you need to<\/span><\/p>\n

Understand what you like in your bad habit<\/span><\/p>\n

Find an alternative, better way to get that reward<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll explain.<\/span><\/p>\n

Television, The Pleasure Application<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n

What are we looking for in watching television show?<\/span><\/p>\n

Escape. Entertainment. Distraction. \u201cTo wind down.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

The real answer is: pleasure.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why we watch television, play video games, and \u201cdistract\u201d ourselves in many different ways. There\u2019s nothing wrong with that.<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, it\u2019s a great thing. Pretty much every desire we have, even the noblest, are paths to pleasure (e.g., being kind and charitable for the warmth that comes from acknowledging one\u2019s own goodness and doing the deeds themselves). <\/span><\/p>\n

If we are to be dopamine addicts, though, why don\u2019t we think a little more, long-term? <\/span><\/p>\n

If you spend, let\u2019s say, 15 hours a week watching television (and I\u2019m going to count Instagram\/Facebook videos among these as well, which would probably bump that number up), cut it down to 10. <\/span><\/p>\n

Why? <\/span><\/h3>\n

Well, first, how<\/i>. If you download the FocusMe application, you can set times of the day and periods of focus to block all applications and websites that might make these distractions available (I, for one, don\u2019t own a TV. I watch shows through the magical internet, ala Netflix and Amazon Prime). <\/span><\/p>\n

Okay, back to the \u201cwhy?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Because with those five extra hours a week, you can put that time towards a project you already dedicate time to \u2013 e.g., learning a language or building a business. Or, the extra free time could be used to begin a new project\u2026like learning a language. Or writing. Or spending time with family. There are tons of worthwhile ventures that you probably consider valuable but think you don\u2019t have time to do. <\/span><\/p>\n

If I have to explain how, in the long-term, these ventures will provide more pleasure for you than a few hours of pleasure now, then you have bigger problems than productivity. What you dream of doing, but excuse yourself from actually doing, usually is what you should be doing (i.e., what will give you the greatest pleasure, since you will be, well, living your dream). <\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not saying watching television or random funny videos is a bad thing. No. It\u2019s fun and pleasurable, which is good. It\u2019s a simply a matter of how bad and how quickly you want your other goals to come to fruition (luckily, as a writer, watching any story, be it on a book or on the screen, counts as research for me! Muahaha). <\/span><\/p>\n

Focus on the Work, Not the Emails<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n

I write. A lot. I sometimes can spend twenty minutes crafting a Facebook status (pathetic, I know). Imagine, then, how long I might spend on something I consider \u2018important,\u201d like a business email?<\/span><\/p>\n

Not as much, actually.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kidding.<\/span><\/p>\n

I try to check my emails only once or twice a day and respond to the important ones. The conversational emails, I leave for when I feel like I\u2019ve deserved them or for when I want to respond to them. <\/span><\/p>\n

A better way to enforce this (because willpower is often unreliable with productivity), is to use FocusMe. You can block Gmail or whatever other archaic method you use for email management while you focus on the important tasks. <\/span><\/p>\n

For some perspective, let\u2019s give emails the same \u201cwhy?\u201d treatment. <\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s the Productive Payoff in Emails?<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n

In other words, what are we looking for when we read emails?
\nThis may seem like an inane question. \u201cWe\u2019re doing work!\u201d you say. And you probably are. But how many of those emails require urgent attention? How many can be pushed aside until you complete your primary task? I\u2019m sure one of the emails you planned on responding to counts among these. <\/span><\/p>\n

Another answer to the question of \u201cwhy are we responding to these emails?\u201d is this: <\/span>we want to feel<\/i> productive.<\/span><\/p>\n

After reading through a few emails, we feel like we\u2019re making some progress, like something is being done. And, again, you might be responding to an important notice about a project you\u2019re working on. Maybe. <\/span><\/p>\n

But how much is actually getting done, I wonder? What percentage of that project, task, or page was improved by reading and responding to that email? <\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m willing to bet a Cheeto that you are just getting a dopamine hit from it. <\/span><\/p>\n

If so, get back to work. Be more productive. Get shit done. <\/span><\/p>\n

*grumble grumble*<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is Watching Television Still High in Trend? The exact numbers differ with ethnicity, and increase with age, but, if you are between the ages of 18 and 35, you probably spend an average of 25 hours a week watching television. That\u2019s a part time job. As for emails, the McKinsey Institute found that 28% of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":4896,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,23],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-4891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-habits","category-technology","tag-productivity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusme.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}