Is life really short? And does it even matter?

You could spend your whole life contemplating the nature of time – until something big hits you. Like, say, becoming a parent. Having children forces you to rethink time in terms of small units that are in limited supply.

Sharing the magic of a visit from Santa with your kids is a good example. When you break it down, you're only likely to have that experience eight times: from the ages of three to 10. That doesn't sound like much, does it?

Once you accept that time is a finite quantity, "life is too short for x" is no longer just a figure of speech. You must ask yourself what exactly life is too short for, then eliminate that thing.

It's all too easy for unnecessary experiences to eat up your time, whether it's feuds, bureaucracy, or traffic jams. These things enter your life in two ways: either they're imposed on you or you've let them sneak in.

Sometimes circumstances force us to put up with time-wasting nonsense. When you need to earn a living, that comes with the territory.

One way of avoiding this is to prioritize efficiency over money and prestige. Gravitate to clients/employers that waste less of your time.

The BS you allow to sneak into your life is harder to eliminate. Let's say you write a lot of testy emails. This is likely rooted in a primitive (and addictive) impulse to defend yourself: one that has little relevance in modern living. Let it go.

Find out what matters to you. It takes most people years and years to distinguish between what's truly important to them and what's not. The most common thing that disappears with age is caring what others think of you.

Ask yourself whether you'll care about something on your deathbed. Sneaky nonsense has a way of announcing itself with a sharp spike of importance. This lodges in your consciousness like a pin and gets stuck there, lingering on even when it no longer matters.

What truly matters in life isn't necessarily what most people would consider important. Catching up with a friend, for example, is unlikely to feel like a waste. One advantage of being a parent is that kids force you to spend time on something that does matter: them.

Bottom line: Once you've identified what matters to you, focus on getting more of it. Stop waiting. Stop procrastinating. Remind yourself that the window of opportunity is closing. Don't let the shortness of life take you by surprise. It happens all the time.