Stage Six: Create New Time

Stage Six: Create New Time

I Am Still Here. I Am Alive. I Have the Power.

There is a phrase we often use as we get older: “I need to make up for lost time.”

We say it about the education we postponed, the places we never visited, the friendships we neglected, the career opportunity we missed, the business we never started, the years we gave almost entirely to work, marriage, children, caregiving, or simply surviving.

Can time really be made up?

The years are gone. Some opportunities went with them; our children grew up, parents aged, careers changed, and relationships evolved. Some doors closed, some people left, and we changed too. Perhaps the invitation is not to spend the next chapter chasing the years behind us. Perhaps it is to do something much more powerful: Create new time.

When Did Time Stop Belonging to You?

Think about an ordinary day in the busiest years of your life. What time did you wake up? And who immediately owned the hours that followed? Children needed preparing, work needed you. A spouse needed something, parents needed checking on. There were deadlines, school meetings, shopping lists, church commitments, community responsibilities, phone calls, traffic, reports, family functions and emergencies that were never in the diary. We became very good at managing time. But perhaps we rarely asked: How much of my time actually belongs to me?

Because there is a difference between managing time and owning time.

Many of us became excellent time managers while having very little time that was truly ours.

“When I Have Time…” How many things have you postponed with those four words?

When I have time…I will visit her, exercise, read that book, go back to school, take that trip, start writing, learn to swim, call my friend, rest, sort out my finances, take care of myself, or do something I enjoy. But time rarely presents itself at the door and announces: “Good morning. I am the free time you have been waiting for.” There will always be something that can fill it.

Creating new time means becoming intentional about what gets access to your life.

Retirement Does Not Automatically Create Time

We sometimes imagine retirement is the great liberation. Finally! No alarm clock, traffic, office politics, meetings, Monday mornings! Then retirement arrives and something surprising happens. The diary fills again. Family assumes you are available, community responsibilities increase, consultancy work appears (Hallelujah!), grandchildren need help, someone needs to be taken somewhere, and committees discover you.

People say: “But you are retired. You are free!”

Are you? Are you really free?

Retirement can remove employment from your calendar without necessarily giving you ownership of your time. The same happens when children leave home, when we become self-employed, or when we begin working from home. An empty space is quickly occupied unless we decide what it is for. If you doubt this, I have a small question ; for those who are no longer paying school fees, show us the money you are now saving.

The Calendar Tells the Truth

Look at your calendar, not your intentions, or your priorities written in a beautiful notebook, and I have many of these. Your actual calendar; does your health, friendships, learning, spiritual life feature in the calendar? Where is adventure, family, quiet time, joy, and most importantly: Where are you? We often say something is important to us, but our calendars tell a different story, if something matters, perhaps eventually it needs an appointment, even with yourself.

The Guilt of Doing Nothing

Creating new time also means reconsidering our relationship with rest. For people who have spent decades being productive, doing nothing can feel surprisingly uncomfortable. You sit down and immediately think: What should I be doing? You take an afternoon off and feel guilty. You go on holiday, carry your laptop and continue answering emails. You rest and explain why. Some of us have become so accustomed to measuring our worth through productivity that rest feels like laziness. But rest is not the absence of purpose, sometimes rest protects purpose. Not every hour must produce something, I love the phrase ‘recharging my batteries’ as it is a very important activity and some hours can simply restore the person who has spent years producing.

Create Time for the People Who Matter

Stage Six is not only about creating time for ourselves, it is also about becoming more intentional about who receives our time. As life progresses, relationships change, some friendships survive decades despite distance and long silences, while others quietly disappear. Some people remain in our lives mainly because they have always been there, and sometimes we meet someone later in life and wonder: Where have you been all these years?

Creating new time may mean calling the old friend, having lunch without watching the clock, visiting your parents, while you still can, listening to your adult children without immediately advising them, playing with your grandchildren. Creating new friendships, joining a community, and sitting around a table talking about nothing urgent. Time is one of the most meaningful things we give another human being because, unlike money, we cannot earn it back.

But Some People Need Less of Your Time

This is also true and not every relationship deserves unlimited access to you. Some conversations leave you depleted; some people only call when they need something. Some relationships survive entirely because you keep maintaining them. Some obligations continue because nobody has ever asked whether they still make sense. Creating new time sometimes requires reclaiming time from things that no longer deserve so much of it. Not necessarily with anger or dramatically. Sometimes simply by becoming less available. A boundary is not always a wall, sometimes it is a gate. You decide when it opens.

Stop Waiting for Company

There is another way we lose time; we wait for someone to travel with, eat with, and to attend the event with. Sometimes we just need someone to start the course with, someone who likes the same things and is available on the same weekend. And while we wait, life moves. There is something powerful about reaching a stage where you can say: I would love company, but my life will not stop because nobody is available.

Take the road trip, book the experience, attend the concert, as long as you enjoy it. Some years back I bought tickets to a performance and ended up attending it alone. I was not familiar with the performances, and, so, despite the loud music and sounds, I slept! Like really slept and since I was alone, no one could wake me up. Great break I thought later. Make sure you understand and enjoy whatever you decide to get into. Join that class, have coffee, travel, explore; you may discover that being alone and being lonely are not the same thing. And you may meet people you would never have encountered had you stayed home waiting for somebody else’s diary to align with yours.

New Time Does Not Have to Be Big

We can make this too ambitious. You do not need to disappear to the Maldives for three months to reclaim your time. New time can be very ordinary; thirty minutes before everyone wakes up, a morning walk, one Saturday a month. Lunch with a friend, a weekly class, an afternoon with your phone switched off. Reading before bed instead of scrolling, a monthly road trip, a quiet cup of tea, a Sunday afternoon nap without apology. It could also be one evening on which you accept no invitations, a few minutes sitting in your car before going into the house, as long as it is safe. Small spaces of time can become sacred when they are deliberately yours.

Beware of the Revenge Calendar

There is a danger at this stage. After years of sacrifice, we may suddenly want to do everything; travel everywhere, join anything and everything, reconnect with everyone, take multiple courses, start three businesses at the same time, exercise every morning, see every friend, accept every interesting invitation. We can turn reclaiming time into another exhausting project and that is not freedom. You do not have to fill every newly created space, some space should remain space. A full calendar is not necessarily a full life.

The Suitcase is Changing

Our suitcase has travelled quite a distance. It once carried dreams and possibility. Then came careers, relationships, responsibilities and expectations. Later came disappointment, missed opportunities, grief, broken trust and words that wounded. Stage Four awakened us. Stage Five asked us to choose ourselves again.

Now, in Stage Six, perhaps we place something different into the suitcase: Intention.

We carry what matters, make room for what nourishes us, and perhaps we leave some space empty. Because we do not yet know what wonderful thing may need that space later.

The New Time Map

Take a blank page and write eight simple headings:

MORE OF: What deserves more of my time?

LESS OF: What is taking too much?

START: What have I been postponing?

STOP: What am I ready to stop giving time to?

CONTINUE: What already brings meaning to my life?

EXPLORE: What am I curious about?

EXPERIENCE: What do I want to experience while I still can?

PROTECT: What time, relationship, habit or part of myself must I protect?

Do not create another performance plan, just notice your answers and you may be surprised by what appears.

Perhaps the Real Question Is Not “How Much Time Do I Have?”

None of us knows.

At 30, we assume there is plenty. At 50, we begin doing calculations. At 60, perhaps we become more conscious. At 70 and beyond, time may feel increasingly precious. But perhaps counting the years is not the most useful exercise. A better question might be: How do I want to live whatever time I have? That changes the conversation, because; whether we have thirty years ahead or three, today still contains choices.

Your Turn

This week, look at your life through the lens of time.

Ask yourself:

What deserves more of my time now?

What receives too much of it?

Who do I want to spend more time with?

What am I still postponing?

What am I doing mainly from habit or obligation?

Where do I need to become less available?

What would I love to experience?

What would I do if I stopped waiting for somebody to join me?

What space do I need to protect?

And finally:

If I could create one new piece of time that belonged entirely to me, what would I do with it?

Then create it, put it in the diary and protect it. And when the guilt arrives, and it may, remind yourself: I am not stealing time from my life. I am putting myself back into it.

We Are Not Finished Yet

There is something freeing about Stage Six. We stop trying to recover yesterday, punishing ourselves for what we did not do, and racing against the clock. Instead, we turn toward what remains, there is still a life to live, people to meet, places to see, books to read, things to learn, conversations to have, quiet mornings to enjoy, roads to travel, laughter that has not happened yet and perhaps even dreams we have not dreamed yet. So do not just make up for lost time;

Create new time.

Create time for what matters, the people you love, rest, adventure, and for possibility. And most importantly, create some time for you.

Because the story is not over.

I am still here.
I am alive.
I have the power.

Join the conversation

Complete this sentence:

“If I created more time for myself, I would…………………………………………………”

Your answer might be one word or an entire new chapter.

#ReclaimingYourself

#AConversationWorthHaving

#CreateNewTime

#StageSix

#IAmStillHere

 #IAmAlive

 #IHaveThePower