Time wasted is something that I believe everyone needs to experience in order to become aware of what it truly means.
What does it mean to waste your time?
To me, I think it is a matter of looking at a situation and being able to identify a potential opportunity for growth - if there is no room to grow, then you are wasting your time.
I believe people need to waste enough of their time in order to gain the ability of identifying an opportunity for growth or not.
With that being said, I think people also need to have a certain level of self-awareness an self-accountability to be able to learn from their past mistakes otherwise, they will continue to find themselves in positions of wasting their time and stagnant growth.
The only way someone truly learns is by being put into the same position and being able to apply different behavior.
If you are one that is put into the same position over and over again and your behavior has not changed, you lack the capacity to learn and you lack general intelligence.
I have found that wasting enough time can serve as a fantastic motivator in being able to distinguish what you will and what you aren't willing to accept in your life.
So, the real question then becomes: how do you know if you are wasting your time?
I think if you are the type of individual that truly knows who they are and what they want in life, it will be much easier to be able to identify what is and what isn't worth your time.
If you know that you have places to be and you have things to do, you will naturally be able to pick up on things that are distracting you from being able to live out your life's purpose.
This does not go without mentioning that you MUST be driven towards something greater.
You must be focused on something larger than yourself and work everyday towards achievement to truly be able to identify time wasted.
If you go to work at a 9-5 and sit there and do absolutely nothing with your time or your productivity, you are wasting your time. It doesn't matter if you make good money doing nothing, the point is, you could be doing something bigger and you're not!
How a man does one thing is oftentimes how he does everything. If he shows up to work and does nothing with his time, who is to say that he would ever make a reliable husband or a father?
I think when it comes to choosing the right people in your life, being able to identify time wasted is the single most important factor to consider.
If you can gain the ability to identify someone that is wasting your time and develop the ability to remove them from your life, you will become that much stronger in being able to accomplish your mission - living a good life.
How can you identify if someone is wasting your time?
I have learned this to be extremely simple in the sense that I see every relationship as an equal exchange of value.
If all you do is give and all someone else does is take, they serve absolutely no purpose in your life.
This also doesn't go without mentioning that you MUST be able to identify the people that want to see you win in life and motivate you to become a better version of yourself.
If all you do is surround yourself with people that tell you everything that you want to hear, you are wasting your time with those people.
Oftentimes, it is the people that tell you the things that you don't want to hear that have your back the most.
I believe that when it comes to having a team of supporters or choosing the right partner to spend the rest of your life with, they must be able to motivate you to be a better person.
The woman a man chooses will either be his ultimate source of strength or ultimate source of weakness. If she cannot bring the absolute best out of him, he is wasting his time trying to be with her.
The same rule applies for women - if your man cannot inspire you to become the best possible woman that you can become, if you cannot look at him and think to yourself "this man genuinely makes me want to be a better person", then you are wasting your time.
This does not go without mentioning that one must first be driven to become better themselves and work towards becoming better on their own time before anyone else can step in and bring their true best out of them.
The problem I think most people face today is desperation.
People are desperate to find love or desperate to find friendship and all they will continue to do is attract people that don't genuinely value them because they associate their lack of with a negative intention.
If you cannot work to bring the best out of yourself, no one else is going to be able to do it for you.
I have wasted enough time in my life to be able to identify when someone has a pure intention and when someone is truly desperate.
I have learned that it does not matter how good you are to someone else, it is not your job to save someone else from themselves - they have to work to save themselves in order for someone else to come in and bring the best out of them.
Energy is magnetic and what you put out into the universe is what you will receive.
You could be the most kind person but you must be able to identify what your intentions truly are and you must understand that there will always be people that try and take advantage of you - it is a part of life.
It is your job to be able to focus on what you truly want in life, the people that you need around you to help you grow, and take the necessary steps towards achieving your goals in life.
There are always going to be setbacks, there will always be people that try and take you for everything that you are worth, but it is your responsibility to remain true to yourself and your values.
If you learn to value things of genuine substance - if you learn to value things like genuine connections, instead of valuing things of shallow substance such as looks and status, you will attract the like-minded people that will want the best for you.
Hold yourself accountable, have some self-respect, and always be willing to work at becoming the best version of yourself so that you can say "no" to time wasted.