Remember: the time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself. Life's cruelest irony.
Douglas CouplandRead
If you waste five minutes of time a day, over the course of a year that adds up to one full work day. Think of five wasted minutes as a slow-release holiday drug. Savour it.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Time wasted accumulates significantly, highlighting the value of every minute.
This quote emphasizes the importance of time management by illustrating how seemingly insignificant moments, like just five minutes a day, can add up over a year to one full work day. Coupland invites us to savor these moments instead of dismissing them, suggesting that even short breaks have value and can enhance our productivity and enjoyment of life.
Themes
TimeManagementProductivityValueWasting
In practice
Example use cases
During a productivity workshop, this quote can be shared to emphasize effective time management.
More from Douglas Coupland
All quotes →...we're told by TV and Reader's Digest that a crisis will trigger massive personal change--and that those big changes will make the pain worthwhile. But from what he could see, big change almost never happens. People simply feel lost. They have no idea what to say or do or feel or think. they become messes and tend to remain messes.
Douglas CouplandRead
When the world throws you too much information, the only way you can stay sane or survive is to look for pattern recognition. Amidst all the blurs, is there a constellation that emerges, is there a straight line that's emerging?
Douglas CouplandRead
I'm not patient - and I'm getting more impatient as I get older - but I am disciplined about writing, and I want that on my tombstone: 'He wasn't patient, but he was disciplined.'
Douglas CouplandRead
When someone tells you they’ve just bought a house, they might as well tell you they no longer have a personality. You can immediately assume so many things: that they’re locked into jobs they hate; that they’re broke; that they spend every night watching videos; that they’re fifteen pounds overweight; that they no longer listen to new ideas. It’s profoundly depressing.
Douglas CouplandRead
You've seen what you've seen; you've felt what you've felt. Ideology is for people who don't trust their own experiences and perceptions of the world.
Douglas CouplandRead
Similar quotes
Ten minutes are not just one-sixth of your hourly pay; ten minutes is a piece of yourself. Divide yourself into ten units and sacrifice as few of them as possible in meaningless activities. Most things still remain to be done.
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Time is an equal opportunity employer. Each human being has exactly the same number of hours and minutes in a day.
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How did it get so late so soon? Its night before its afternoon. December is here before its June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?
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Time is a brisk wind, for each hour it brings something new.
ParacelsusRead
The Bible does not thrill; the Bible nourishes. Give time to the reading of the Bible and the recreating effect is as real as that of fresh air physically.
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We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are valued not for what they are but for what they do or what they have - for their usefulness.
Thomas MertonRead