--- title: How to Use Time Wisely: Advice From a CEO and Professor description: Chartbeat founding CEO Tony Haile believes, "You must contemplate the fact that you will die and thus that time is fleeting." canonical: https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/ author: Tony Haile article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-05-02T13:59:46.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T09:02:13.313Z og:title: How to Use Your Time as Wisely as Possible og:description: 'You must contemplate the fact that you will die and thus that time is fleeting' og:url: https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d6fba5a36b1603e/698878c0bc6cfc6fcb3db33d/pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2500 og:image:height: 1406 og:image:alt: pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas-motto-stock og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How to Use Your Time as Wisely as Possible twitter:description: 'You must contemplate the fact that you will die and thus that time is fleeting' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d6fba5a36b1603e/698878c0bc6cfc6fcb3db33d/pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How to Use Your Time as Wisely as Possible > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: September 2026. ## TIME Worth Your Time: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Worth Your Time is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. A weekly guide to what to watch, read, and more. Worth Your Time is a curated guide to the culture worth knowing, from the biggest conversations of the moment to the books, shows, ideas and discoveries worth your attention. Culture editor Eliza Berman taps TIME's collective taste and perspective to surface what is worth watching, reading, talking about and sharing, and why. 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It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-worth-2026q3/newsletters?i=48e635bd-f607-4d1e-9c2f-d0b1c1335fd0&cr=time-nl-worth-2026q3-v1) by [Tony Haile](https://time.com/author/tony-haile/) ## Tony Haile May 2, 2016 1:59 PM UTC  Molly Cranna for TIME by [Tony Haile](https://time.com/author/tony-haile/) ## Tony Haile May 2, 2016 1:59 PM UTC To properly value my time, I have to constantly remind myself that it is scarce. Both Buddhist and Western philosophies (such as stoicism and epicureanism) say that, to truly value your time, you must contemplate the fact that you will die and thus that time is fleeting. Some call this morbid and would rather not think about their own mortality. They do their best to think of their time as infinite, and infinite goods have little value. It is only when we struggle to breathe that we appreciate air, when we are in periods of drought that we appreciate rain. On my phone, I have a simple countdown timer app called T-Zero. I looked up the [actuarial lifespan of a male in the U.S.](https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html) (76 years), and I created a timer that counts down the time until my 76th birthday. Watching the seconds and minutes pass and knowing that they are finite encourages me to ask myself how I am using my time. Do I really want to spend these precious minutes playing a game for the 100th time or aimlessly browsing reddit? Or do I want to spend that time talking to my wife, learning something new or helping to create the change I want to see in the world? Sometimes, I really do want to play that game. But often, it helps to reset my perspective and focus on what matters. That same concept of counting down time, when applied on a more prosaic level, is probably the single greatest driver of my productivity. It is sometimes called the pomodoro technique, but the point is to set a timer—usually for 25 minutes—that you can easily see. Pick a task, focus on that task exclusively for 25 minutes and then stop and take a five-minute break. Repeat. When you want to check Facebook or when you get a ping from an email notification (although I recommend turning all of your notifications off), you’ll know that you’ve set aside time at the end of the countdown to do those things so that you can focus on your work. You’ll be amazed at what you achieve the first day you start using this method. **_Read more:_** [_9 Secrets the Most Productive People Know_](http://motto.time.com/4284937/productive-people-secrets/) It’s also important to review your day. Malcolm Gladwell popularized the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something. However, it’s not simply 10,000 hours of doing a job. There are many managers who have spent more than 10,000 hours managing and yet show little progress. Gladwell was referring to 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. That means consciously being aware of what you are doing, reviewing how you performed and then adjusting your behavior based on your learnings. **_Read more:_** [_What You Can Learn From a Military General About How to Build Better Habits_](http://motto.time.com/4285675/build-better-habits/) It’s hard. However, the best way to start is simply by spending some time at the end of the day writing a review of your own performance. I use a set of standard questions, such as: * Were there any occasions today where you lost your cool or spoke without thinking? * What stopped you from being maximally productive today, and what can you change? * Were there any interactions you would do differently with the benefit of hindsight? * How much did you listen and ask questions today, as opposed to talking and issuing statements? These help me review my performance and think about how I can do better tomorrow. _Tony Haile is the founding CEO of_ [_Chartbeat_](https://chartbeat.com/)_, the leading data toolset for global newsrooms and an adjunct professor of journalism at Stanford University and Columbia University._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/"},"headline":"How to Use Your Time as Wisely as Possible","datePublished":"2016-05-02T13:59:46.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T09:02:13.313Z","description":"'You must contemplate the fact that you will die and thus that time is fleeting'","url":"https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/","keywords":["motto","advice","Time management"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d6fba5a36b1603e/698878c0bc6cfc6fcb3db33d/pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tony Haile","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tony-haile/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1d6fba5a36b1603e/698878c0bc6cfc6fcb3db33d/pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas-motto-stock","caption":"pen-notepad-2-advice-success-work-to-do-ideas-motto-stock","creditText":"Molly Cranna for TIME","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/motto/","name":"motto"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4289025/time-wisely-tony-haile/","name":"How to Use Your Time as Wisely as Possible"}}]}] ```