Time Management Worksheet: The 168 Hours Exercise

If you constantly feel like you don’t have enough time to achieve certain things in your life, then I think this exercise in time management is really the place to start.

A lot of people are very inaccurate when it comes to estimating how much time they have for activities. I bet if you asked a random group of people why they don’t learn a new language, someone will reply that they “don’t have time,” but this exercise might go to show you that you do, in fact, have time.

This exercise was really eye-opening for me, and so I created a free printable/downloadable worksheet that you can access and try this time management exercise yourself (see below).

The Premise

This exercise is based on the idea that we have 7 x 24 hours in a week, that is: 168 hours. Many of us don’t realize where our time actually goes, and for me, working this out actually helped see that I spend a lot more time doing things that aren’t adding value to my life than I had previously thought.

I’m including insight into my life, so as to give you an example of what this exercise can look like. If you check the estimated total of hours spent per week, you’ll find that I actually have quite a few hours left over…where does that time go?

[I suspect TikTok and Instagram and the like, whoops.]

Time Management: Now It’s Your Turn

I encourage you to try the exercise for yourself: sit down and work it out. Personally, I did it for the first time when I was rushing a sorority (that’s right, I was in a sorority), and it was revolutionary. It became immediately obvious that I was wasting so much more time than I had previously estimated, and it allowed me to make better use of my time.

FREE 168 HOURS DOWNLOADABLE WORKSHEET

In the folder, you’ll find:

• a PDF version (great as a printable)
• a Pages version for Mac users (with built in formulas that will automatically calculate your hours for you)
• a Word document (editable, but no formula so you have to calculate by hand)

I sincerely hope that this exercise benefits you as it does me, whenever I redo it for whatever stage of my life I’m in.

To access my downloadable desktop and phone wallpapers, head over and download them here.