Read the full transcript of technophile and teacher Hitesh Choudhary’s talk titled “The Secrets of Modern Time Management”, at TEDxCITBengaluru, September 7, 2022.
Listen to the audio version here:
Introduction: Who Am I and What I Do
HITESH CHOUDHARY: Hey there, everyone. Hi, my name is Hitesh. I hope many of you might be knowing it. In order to understand what I’m trying to speak and what I’m trying to convey in this talk, it’s very important to know a bit about me, what I do, what I don’t do and all that stuff.
So by passion, I’m a teacher. That is the core soul and heart of what I do. I love teaching and that’s what I do day in and day out. But apart from this, I do a few more stuff. So far, I have recorded over 100 courses. Each of the course contains around 100 videos, give or take. Apart from that, I also run a YouTube channel, which is constantly growing around 700,000 subscribers. I’m insanely active on Instagram. I love to just be on Instagram day in and day out.
Apart from that, I run four startups. In one of them, I am CTO currently. And apart from this, I’m founder of other three. And I am also a traveler. So far, 31 countries. After that, 2022 happened and stuff, you know. After that, not only that, I also dedicate around four hours in a week to my health, running, gymming, whatever that is.
The Question Everyone Asks
So constantly I’ve been thrown this question around that “How Hitesh, how you’re managing all of this? What’s the secret around it?” Because I’m pretty sure all of you have read those self-help books: wake up at five o’clock, leave your mobile phones, uninstall all the app, turn off all the notification. How is it that working for you? I’m pretty sure not great. You are still struggling that how we can manage the time.
See, the point is, you need to understand that modern problems requires modern solution. And that is why this talk is here, that how modern time management works. It is not going to solve everything by waking up at five o’clock. We have seen that it doesn’t work. You have tried it one week, two weeks. That’s it. It dies out.
You have tried trying to detox yourself from the mobile phone. It doesn’t work. It’s a part of your life. It’s almost like saying that, “Hey, you need to detox yourself from clothes.” It doesn’t work. It used to work in early stage age. Now it doesn’t work.
So here are my few secrets that I’m going to reveal in front of you, that how do I manage all of this and how you can also take some of the tips from it. Maybe some of these things are going to work for you.
Step Zero: The Ultimate Truth About Time
So starting with the first, of course, I’m a programmer, so I start with zero. So step zero is make sure you understand that you cannot manage time. This is the ultimate truth. No matter what you do, you cannot manage time.
But there is a little bit more to it. Once you make yourself happy, okay, time, I cannot manage because you plan things out, but it doesn’t work out. Maybe you have a plan today that I’ll go for a run or workout, but time is not going to allow you. It’s always runs against you. Life is predictably unpredictable. Make sure you always understand that.
The Real Solution: Manage People, Not Time
So moving on, if time management, the first step is you cannot manage time. So how does it work? It works with a simple step: manage people. I cannot manage time. So I’m going to manage people.
How do I manage people? There are two types of people. The first one is who need your time and the second one who wants your time. Always the bubble of people who want your time is way bigger than the people who need your time.
So the first thing you have to manage is people who need your time, your parents, your loved ones, your girlfriends, your boyfriend. They need your time. They don’t want your time, they need your time. Once you sort them out properly, then try to arrange that who are these people who want my time and try to give them time piece by piece.
Time is the most precious thing that you can have. So make sure you allocate that very, very clearly. And again, you have to learn how to manage people in order to give them some time slots. So people are very tricky. It’s not easy to manage people. And that’s why I always give that understand people.
If you’re not giving time to your girlfriend or boyfriend or a mom or dad, one day they’re going to become into the bursting category. They’re going to demand your entire day. That is very costly.
So instead of giving them an entire day, try to dedicate and give them one or two hours daily so that they don’t come into the category of “want my time.” They are into the category of “need your time.” And then obviously your boss needs your time, your employees need your time and all of that. So make sure you figure out who needs my time on priority today and allocate some time to them. That’s how the first step works.
I take always inspiration from the kids. Kids are the best example of how to manage their time. Their mind is always focused about how can I take more time to play, enjoy. And when the dad comes at home, they sit down with their books open to learn. They have already mastered how to manage people. They know how to manage their dad. Dad wants to see me studying. I study or not. That’s a different thing. But they have understood.
They have figured it out that my dad wants me to study. So when the dad comes from office, they’re always book open. That is one thing you can learn from these kids.
Step Number Two: Social Media
How many of you have tried to detox yourself from the social media? I have tried. A lot of have tried. Does it work? Not at all. When you come back onto social media, it actually is worse. So what I’ve done here is my secret trick for that. This is all what we have done. Late night endless scroll of the social media, Instagram reels. Thank God, TikTok is not here, but in many places it is there.
So the tip is, it is not avoidable. You cannot avoid social media. Stop struggling from it. But if you cannot avoid it, master it, rule it. Follow those people who make you inspired to do more. Follow people who do workout daily. Follow those people who put up some motivation. Follow those programmers who write great code. We cannot avoid it. So follow those people who make this social media enjoyable. Make it more learning. Don’t follow 1,000 or 50,000 people randomly. Follow wisely people who inspire you to do something. And as I say, if you cannot move the mountain, climb the mountain. So this is how social media, you don’t need to avoid it. You need to rule it.
A lot of people overestimate their time. “I can do gym. I can do running. I can do assignment. I can watch this video series. I can watch this Netflix.” You are doing it wrong. You are asking yourself that “I have too much of time.” You don’t have. Your time allows you to do only two things in a day. Just two things.
So this is entirely your life, entire red box. Consider this as your life or a day in a life. You can only fit in two things. And I call them as white circle and a black circle. White circle is the thing that I want to do. And black circle is something which people want me to do. I want to work out. I want to make videos. This is my priority. But people, I have a job. I am a functional CTO. So I need to manage a lot of people.
So what people want, people want a lot of meeting from me. People want me to take a lot of decision on the daily basis. But I cannot do more than this. So I dedicate my time. Today is a gym day and meeting day. That’s it. Today is a video day and a meeting day. Today we have some release. That’s the company’s work. And after that, what I’ll do? Probably work out. That’s it. Two things in a day. That’s all the things.
You see, there is a lot of empty space in your life still after putting these circles. Those all things, unwanted things, birthday parties, your friend’s marriage and all of this, this goes in between that. If I can accomplish two tasks in a day, that’s it. I consider my day as very, very fruitful. Job done.
Step Number Four: Reward Yourself
Now this is where a lot of people lag that what should be considered as reward and what should not be considered as reward. Let me put up in this question. A lot of people think that “I’ll turn off my phone and will play PlayStation entire day.” Is it a reward? Yeah, for some people, yes, but is it feasible? Whole day in a park. Sounds good, but you’ll be bored in half an hour, at a max one hour.
Vacation without mail or phone. I’ll go on a vacation on a beach. I’ll not turn on my phone. It sounds great in theory, but in reality, in practical, it doesn’t work at all. You need to plan your reward in which your phone, your work is actually a part of it. If you train your brain like that, okay, I’m going for a vacation, but maybe one hour I need to dedicate to my emails. Maybe one hour I’ll need to check up on Instagram or something. Then your reward actually becomes a reward.
So whatever you are rewarding yourself after intense work, you are buying a MacBook after some lengthy work of six months, that is fine. And it should be considered as fine. So make sure you choose your reward greatly. And again, reward should be there. Without reward, no human works. So make sure you put yourself some rewards are there that if I’m able to work out for six entire months, no break at all, I’ll go for a feast. Or I’ll buy myself the most expensive headphone that I have. Or I’m going to buy this new pair of jeans. So make sure you put reward yourself. That reward is something, and the more honest you are with yourself, it works.
Modern Problems Require Modern Solutions
Now, all of these things which you see up here, without phone, without phone, it doesn’t work. You see them in a lot of books because these books were written when mobile phone was not in the current state. iPhone 13 was not there. This is so good of a phone to resist. Instagram was not there when these books were written. So make sure you understand, modern problem requires modern solution. Now, phone is a part of your life. So rule it.
Now, since you have stayed so long and showed a little bit interest, here’s this bonus tip, smile. This is the bonus tip. Life is predictably unpredictable, mess happens, stuff goes wrong. It will happen every single day. You want to go to gym, you are not going to be going to gym. You want to do a lot of stuff, things are going to go bad.
So here’s my small tip. Don’t control your life. Don’t plan for a month. Don’t plan for a year. Don’t take those new year resolution. It doesn’t work. I tried them myself. For some years it works, for some years it doesn’t work. So what instead I try is, it’s okay to lose control. If I’m not able to work out today, it’s okay. I was not able to. If I’m not able to code today or make a video today, it’s okay. Things happen, restart.
Doesn’t mean tomorrow also needs to go bad. If today is messed up, tomorrow I can fix it. So I always go ahead and believe, and a strong believer of restart. I’m a computer guy. I know a lot of problem can be solved by just turning off the things and turning on the things. Restart works. This is a proven theory in computers. Restart always works. So, most importantly, make sure you plan your day and it’s okay to mess up. Try tomorrow again. Two things, that’s it. In the life, just do and plan and prepare for 10 things.
The True Meaning of Time Management
And here’s my last and the most important thing. I always end up my TED Talks with some of the quotation or some of the theories that I have. Here’s the one. A lot of people misunderstand what is time management. They want to do a thousand different things. You don’t do thousand things. You take one step at a time. You do one thing today, right? That’s it.
Time management is not about doing a hundred things. It’s about just doing a very few things, but consistently. You want to work out? Consistently work out. You want to write code? Consistently write code just for two hours a day. You want to make YouTube videos? Just make one video a day. That’s it. That’s all it takes.
Conclusion: Master Today, Not Tomorrow
So make sure to sum this all up. It is not possible to master time management. You can manage only people. It is not possible to master your entire year, but it is possible, or at least we can try to master today’s day and only today’s day. So make sure you don’t run after reading thousand books of time management instead of just try to sort out just today. That’s it. Live in the moment. Try that out. So that is all from my side. Thank you so much. Thank you.
