INTEGRATING THE SEVEN SLICES

To make the most of the Seven-Slice approach, you should follow a disciplined process. As you’ve likely noticed from the stories at the end of each Slice chapter, the Seven-Slice Method boils down to three phases: assessment, reflection, and action. In practice the method needn’t be so structured, but it’s helpful to break down the process.

PHASE I: ASSESSMENT

This phase answers the central question, “What percentage of time do you spend in each Slice?”

Taking an honest inventory and figuring out what percentage of time you spend in each Slice of your life will illuminate any gaps or overages. Once you’re armed with that information, you can tackle improving those percentages and work toward more frequent feelings of harmony.

Remember, your percentages must add up to 100 percent. That’s all the time you have. My clients and I often laugh together because so many of them end up with a total of 300 percent or something like that when they first try this exercise, saying things like, “Well, I spend 50 percent in my Family Slice, 50 percent in my Work Slice, 50 percent in the Physical.” But you’ve only got 100 percent!

Figure 10.1 provides a visual aid to help you assess where you spend your time. While the process works very simply, you will need to do it a few times to accurately determine the reality of the way you live your life today.

FIGURE 10.1 Assess How You Spend Your Time (Option 1)

For our purposes, we’ll talk through this exercise using the pie chart; however, you could also use the spreadsheet in Figure 10.2 to list the percentages of time you spend in each Slice over any given time period. Some people like to use both the chart and the spreadsheet to record their answers, and others prefer one over the other. Whatever floats your boat.

FIGURE 10.2 Assess How You Spend Your Time (Option 2)

Look at each Slice of your life on the pie chart or spreadsheet, and quickly jot down your best estimate of how much time you spend there.

The key to reaching an accurate assessment is being honest with yourself. In other words, your answers should not reflect what you “hope” or “want” your life to look like. The benefit here is to get an actual picture of what your life looks like right now. Seeing the pie gives you a visual understanding of the value proposition that living a whole life can bring to you and those around you. This process will likely take a few tries to accurately capture your percentages. My experience with this process has been mostly working with individuals one-on-one as well as with executive teams in conference rooms. In both cases, I’ve found it takes people about three attempts to get the accurate percentages. The reason for that is we all seem to have a mental picture of our time management system that may, in fact, differ from reality.

One of the challenges in this self-assessment process is that many of us look at this and attach our life-value system to the Slices of the pie. Meaning, say, if you value your family first, then when you look at the pie, you put this Slice as the highest percentage Slice in your life. However, upon further review, if you have a full-time job outside of the home, then that percentage could not possibly be realistic.

In fact, once this reality starts to come into view for a person, the reaction is often laughter: “What was I thinking when I put down 70 percent for the Family Slice?”

None of us want to gleefully admit that the highest value we hold dear in life shows up in a much lower percentage than we would have ever thought much about.

It’s critical to work through this exercise with a judgment-free mindset. The point isn’t to make yourself feel bad about where your time was spent prior to undertaking this process. Feeling bad about your circumstances won’t change them. The point is to use these percentages as a jumping-off point to help you manage your stress and, if necessary, to intervene in Slices where you want to increase or decrease your time.

PHASE II: REFLECTION

Now that you’ve got an accurate sense of how you spend your time, how do you feel about your results? Were there any Slice percentages that surprised you? Were there any that pleased or disappointed you?

Go through each Slice and answer the following questions. These questions aren’t meant to judge you. Rather, they can help guide you to a practical way to touch each of your Slices and find a way to achieve greater harmony and a sense of balance. The purpose is to find insights into why you spend a fair amount of time in some Slices and little to no time in other Slices.

The Family Slice

1.   Per week, what percentage of my time do I spend in my family life?

2.   When I am there, how available am I?

3.   If I could, would I spend more time there?

The Professional Slice

1.   Per week, what percentage of time does this take for me?

2.    Does it creep into other Slices when I am spending time in those?

3.   Am I in control, or is my work in control of the time?

The Personal Slice

1.   Per week, what percentage of my time do I spend on something I choose to do just for myself?

2.   If I do not spend time here now, when did I last remember spending some time here?

3.   Is there an apparent reason why I don’t?

The Physical Slice

1.   Per week, what percentage of my time do I spend exercising and taking care of myself either formally or informally?

2.   If I do exercise, do I schedule it, or is it random and based on convenience?

3.   If I don’t exercise, why don’t I?

The Intellectual Slice

1.   Per week, how much time do I spend reading or pursuing an intellectual interest?

2.   If I don’t, did I at some point in my life? If so, why did I stop?

3.   If I never have spent time here, what am I curious enough about to want to start now?

The Emotional Slice

1.   Per week, how often (or if at all) do I spend thinking about my feelings?

2.   Am I in control of them, or are they in control of me?

3.   Would having a better understanding of my emotions benefit me in my overall life?

4.   If yes, what would be a practical next step?

The Spiritual Slice

1.   Per week, what percentage of my time is spent in my spiritual life?

2.   If little to none today, was there a point in my life when I did, and why did I stop?

3.   How would I start if I wanted to begin or renew this part of my life?

COMMON OBSERVATIONS AND REACTIONS

The first observation most people make is that some of their Slices have a zero or a single-digit number in the percentage column. It does not seem unusual at all to see two to three Slices with virtually no activity or time spent in them for years. For some people, this realization will be a surprise; for others, it will only be a confirmation of what they already suspected.

The second observation many people make is that they didn’t deliberately drop the currently empty or thin Slices out of their lives. In many cases another Slice, or nothing, took their place in the person’s life.

For instance, someone might not have intentionally stopped having a personal life, but work and family obligations made her too busy to maintain one. Or maybe someone stopped attending his book club during an exceptionally busy time and just never picked it back up.

When confronted with the fact that they’ve left parts of their life dormant, many people immediately respond, “Well, it would be great to do more in [my dormant Slice(s)], but I don’t have any spare time for that.”

That dismissive response is a very human reaction to the idea of change. “It’s not as though I can add more minutes to the day,” people tell themselves. This, of course, would suggest that the only way to increase the percentage in a dormant Slice is to take time away from a currently active Slice. That idea usually doesn’t sit well as a reasonable solution. In Chapter 11, we’ll share case studies where individuals struggled with time management—suffice it to say, it can be done. The path is to define for you the difference between being busy and being productive. What is simply worth doing versus what should be done well.

THE BENEFITS OF INCREASED SELF-AWARENESS

This process will have a direct positive impact on your self-awareness. Slowing down long enough to self-assess in a real and tangible way allows you to pay attention to you. This is not a selfish or self-centered kind of attention. This is almost like you taking a step back and just observing what people do and how they conduct themselves—only in this case, you are the subject.

This is a great time to follow your interest. So many times I have heard, “Oh, I used to love to do that!” when people realize that they used to love running in the woods when they were in college, or that they used to love gardening, or tinkering with electronics, or having dinner with friends, etc.

Our interests and our interest levels begin to come into view when we sit back and take stock. For some, it is a pivotal point where they see the need to change things dramatically. But for many, it becomes apparent that they don’t need to upend their life to attend to their dormant Slices. Rather, just adding a few minutes per week in a couple of empty Slices will deliver a positive benefit.

In my work, I have observed that almost everyone over the age of 45 has at least two to three empty Slices in their life. Literally, they spend no time in 30 percent of their total life. It is not damning by any means; it is a statement of the times we live in where our time often feels “robbed,” or it seems to be pulled from us by the demands of other Slices.

Awareness is the first step to regaining control over the dormancies in your life. When you do activate your dormant Slices, not only will you benefit by feeling more at peace and harmony with your life—you’ll also be more available and able to help others.

You will also discover that you are unique. Really digging into why some Slices dominate your life, and why others don’t, can reveal fascinating insights about you and provide the impetus for you to change aspects of your life.

STRATEGY AND ACTION

By now, I hope you’ve completed the pie chart and/or spreadsheet and quantified how much time you spend in each Slice. You probably have a good idea what’s behind your results, and now you’d like to change some of those percentages. As you’ve read in the stories in Part Two, there’s no “one right way” to integrate your Slices. Rather, the strategy by which you take your newfound self-awareness, follow your interests, and reconnect with all Seven Slices will be unique to you. In fact, it must be unique to you to be successful.

A note before you begin: When undertaking this work, it may be helpful to first identify your motivation style. Specifically, how do you do something well? Are you a self-starter? Are you someone who needs a partner or group participating in the same activity with you to stick with it? Are you someone who often starts off strong when beginning a new endeavor but will drift off if someone doesn’t hold you accountable?

Maybe taking action means enlisting the help of your significant other, friend, or coworker. Or maybe you’re more effective when you work on your own. In any case, knowing your style (and acting accordingly) can help better your chances of success when you undertake the Seven-Slice Method.

Addition, Not Subtraction

I like to suggest that the solution is by addition, not subtraction. Obviously, you want to spend some more time in the Slices of your life where you find yourself spending little to no time—but in many cases it’s not practical (or a good idea) to take time away from other Slices, like work or family. Instead, try to find the remote or empty areas in your life and then fill them with activities that revolve around your dormant Slices. You probably won’t equalize the percentages spent in each Slice this way, but you will feel a clear sense of being more balanced.

What is creating this sense of balance is the heightened awareness of living in harmony with all Seven Slices of your life.

Setting Boundaries

Think Micro, Think Tactical

Through the process of people deciding to spend time in their Personal Slices, they learn how to slow down, even for short periods of time.

This may seem simple, but I work with many people who run at such a fast pace that they need their adrenaline “on” most of the time just to keep up with the life they have built for themselves. So when they decide to pursue two Slices of their life (Intellectual and Personal) by scheduling a 15-minute reading time before they go to bed, that small window of time allows them to “turn off” their adrenaline and enjoy their reading and alone time.

Over a period, usually around three weeks, it becomes part of their habitual life, and the calm and the pleasure of the activity begin to take hold. The change in their attitude often amazes them.

When you make even a mild commitment to invest in dormant Slices and lead a more balanced life, your interest levels and energy will likely increase. Basically, when you take action to activate dormant Slices in the hope of living a more balanced life and you notice a minor improvement, it seems to release an energy and a sense of relief that you can control how you feel in the face of life’s challenges.

Maybe you and your spouse have three children under four years of age, and you’re wondering when you’re going to officially lose your mind because it’s become unbearable. Just spending a few minutes in one or more of your other Slices can be enough to give you a lifeline of hope and a reminder that this will not last forever—that your children will grow, they’ll start sleeping regularly, and your life will calm down.

When your stress is all-consuming and there seems to be no way out, a sense of desperation often creeps in and builds slowly over time until one day it is overwhelming. When you counteract that debilitating experience by focusing on the fact that you have Seven Slices in your life, then the circumstances seem to become less overwhelming rather quickly.

Thinking in terms of the Seven Slices allows you to quickly assess what your needs are so that you can maturely pursue additional responsibilities without turning your world upside down because of them. As we all are aware, our society has been in a hurry for some time. A common complaint is, “How can I slow down and stop and smell the roses?”

Spending even a few minutes in the Slices that you were ignoring will aid you in finding that ability to “slow it down” long enough to create more mental ease and less dis-ease. I have found that it isn’t necessarily the amount of time you spend in a Slice that matters, but the quality and the intention.

So think “micro”: what small thing could you do to “touch” your dormant or thin Slices?

For instance, Rosa, a client of mine, found that she was spending no time in her spiritual life. At one time in her life, she regularly attended church service, but that had slipped away after she started working and got married.

Rosa wanted to spend more time in her Spiritual Slice, but it often felt like every minute of her life was accounted for. So she decided to start reading spiritual literature for a few minutes every Wednesday while she had her morning coffee. She enlisted the help of her spouse on those Wednesday mornings to keep her from dumping her coffee into a to-go mug and taking off for the office.

After managing to meet that commitment for the first month, Rosa told me that those 20 minutes a week were making a big difference. She felt it was helping to settle her racing thoughts that had been bothering her for some time. Once she started to experience the benefits of that time alone and enjoy her reading and thinking, she increased the frequency to a few times a week. For Rosa a small investment of time paid big dividends (and maybe it will for you too).

Like Rosa, once you identify and reconnect with a space in your life that needs to be filled, you very well may find an energy is released, and you will devote more time and take on more activities in that Slice.

A FINAL OBSERVATION

I’ve seen many people over the years start spending time in their empty Slices, and what I’ve found is that these people all seem to report an interesting observation: life feels more like a journey now, whereas before it felt like something they had to do or finish.

I think that observation has great merit. When you decide to “add” to your life, instead of “subtracting,” by investing time in a Slice you ignored for a long time, the difference is immediate. This kind of self-care attention where you are learning or soothing or building strength creates an immediate positive feeling inside you. Having worked on this with people for years, I simply cannot see a negative to pursuing the Seven-Slice approach to find a sense of balance and harmony in life.

If you’re a little overwhelmed, try answering the questions below to help get you started and navigate the process:

Assessment

•   What percentage of time do you currently spend in each Slice?

•   Can you validate your estimates?

•   Where do you actually spend your time, if different?

•   How present are you in each of your Slices?

Reflection

•   Are your percentages where you’d like them to be?

•   If not, why not? Drill down here and go beyond just, “I don’t have time.” Try to track the reason why each Slice percentage is what it is.

Strategy and Action

•   What’s in your power to change? What boundaries might you put in place to make sure you touch each of your Slices each week?

•   Are there activities that interest you? What would be the lowest time commitment you would need to touch your dormant Slices? If your interests are in larger, more involved projects, how could you break them down so that they fit into your schedule?

•   Are there activities you might integrate into your schedule that could contribute to two or more Slices?

What do you think? Time to give it a try?

In the next chapter we’ll look at a few examples of how others have generated their own percentages and what they did with the information.