life management

Time & Relationship Management

“All the king’s officials and even the people in the provinces know that anyone who appears before the king in his inner court without being invited is doomed to die unless the king holds out his gold scepter.” Esther4:11 (NLT)

The Persian king Xerxes (or Ahasuerus depending on your translation) was a world ruler and likely the busiest men in his day. That coupled with his infatuation with his own sense of self importance apparently drove him to becoming a time management freak.

His ruthlessness in managing his priorities, to the point of killing anyone who dared to interrupt him, was known throughout the realm. Anyone wanting to do business with him or even any family member wanting to spend time with him risked their very lives in taking initiative to see him.

Imagine the fear of having to deal with, or worse yet having to live, with someone so task oriented and self-protective of his time? Watch out, if the old man is preoccupied, feeling overloaded or in a grumpy mood he could lop off your head for bothering him!

We would all be quick to agree that this is time management run amuck. It is a caricature of how detrimental it is when task management becomes exclusive of relationship management.

Wise time management is first and foremost relationship management.

The book of Esther, documenting the salvation of the Jews through the efforts of Mordecai and Queen Esther, is a great study in the priority of relationship management.

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7 time management principles from the wisest man who ever lived

“There is a time for everything.” Ecclesiastes 3:1

That is quite a statement. Why is it sometimes that does not appear to be true? Too often it seems like there are just not enough hours in the day to accomplish everything we feel we should do. Solomon, considered to be the wisest man who ever lived, penned those words. As the most productive king in Israel’s history he obviously knew something about time management.

Time management experts tell us that time management at its core is really life management. That is an important distinction and makes sense when we consider that Solomon’s book of Ecclesiastes is essentially a book about life management. Wasted time produces wasted lives. And as the Solomon, continually reminds us, wasting time in meaningless pursuits produces meaningless lives. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” (1:2)

Since this extremely wise and accomplished man knew both the profit and pitfalls of life management we would do well to glean as many nuggets of truth as we can from his writings. A careful study of his book reveals what I would consider to be seven of the greatest time management principles ever written. Here they are.