Earlier this year I was introduced to Hugh Culver. We had lots of connections from our commitment to family to his adventures and sailing. Hugh pioneered eco-sailing tours in BC’s Queen Charlotte Islands, among many other achievements.
After our conversation I promised Hugh I would buy his book Give Me A Break: The art of making time work for you. While I bought the book immediately after hanging up the phone, it wasn’t until I took a recent break of my own that I took the time to read Give Me A Break. I started by following Hugh’s advice at the start of the book:
“I don’t want you to read this book word for word–it’s not necessary, nor is it a great use of your time.”
Hugh then went on to show how I could read faster (more words per minute) and how I could gain a lot from Give Me A Break by reading the table of contents, the opening paragraph of every chapter, and all sub-headings, dipping into more detail where a sub-head caught my attention.
With this method I was able to read Give Me A Break in an afternoon, demonstrating just one of the numerous useful ideas in the book. At the end of the day, we choose how we manage our time. Hugh makes it easier for us to focus on those things that are most important to us, putting our maximum time and energy into the most important activities that will move us to our goals.
The book is also filled with useful worksheets. In the chapter Where Does the Time Go? Hugh has a simple worksheet that asks us to add up how much time we spend every day on:
- Meetings
- Interruptions
He then gets you to extrapolate this to hours per week and then weeks, yes weeks, per year that we spend on these activities. For me, Hugh got my attention with this crystal clear observation:
“Ten minutes per day = One week per year”
Our time is rarely lost to really big picture tasks. Our days get frittered away one or two minutes at a time. The great news is that Give Me A Break is jam packed with useful ideas that you can use immediately to gain back control of your calendar and your life. Buy it. Read it. Today. Give Me A Break.
Thanks David! So glad you “found the time” for that read. It’s weird and wonderful thing that something you wrote a while back is still living a life of it’s own.
Thanks for sharing this.
Hi Hugh,
What I like about Give Me A Break is that it is a book for the ages. You can look at it with fresh eyes every year and get new ideas for both managing your time and getting the strategic goals accomplished which you have set for yourself. Thanks for that gift.
David