Have you ever thought to yourself that an additional six or seven hours in a day could really improve your life and productivity? What might you do with all of that extra time? Perhaps you could call on some additional clients, complete some more translations, squeeze in another quick interpretation, make a few phone calls or complete that overdue project. With our hectic schedules, we rarely have the time needed to make personal calls to our loved ones, see our children to bed, watch a movie, cook a dinner, get one Facebook or even just take a quick nap at the end of the day. As a translation worker for many years, I can assure you that adding six hours to the day would not allow us to accomplish anything more. But if our days were longer, my guess is that we would be much more stressed out then we are currently. That’s why we have to keep things in perspective and realize that as Medical Translator workers, we are just as stressed out as everyone else in the world.
We often hear the analogy of the iceberg and 90-percent of the problem being below the water. The same is true in our lives. The problem that we have is not a shortage of time, instead it is a need to set better priorities. The idea of working longer hours isn’t a good idea. Keep in mind, we need balanced lives for a reason. If you run your body at 100-miles per hour every day then you can count on eventually burning out or having a breakdown of some sort. Keep in mind that disbelief and uncertainty are the evils that produce anxiety and they will degrade your energy and well-being. Several years ago, an owner of a Miami Translator company that once employed me said, “Your greatest danger is allowing the critical things to crowd out the important.” He probably didn’t think that I was listening to him at the time, but I was. In fact, it was a serious lesson that I have learned about setting priorities.
Our space consistent of an atmosphere in which we live in a life between the critical and the essential. In many situations, we only believe that the critical action must take place at a precise time. However, this only creates a constant bombardment of stress inducing demands and then more and more demands as internal pressure mounts to new highs. Not even a heavily fortified military complex with shields of defense can keep out simple stressors in life that demand our critical time and attention. The momentary appeal of new distractions seem irresistible and important, and they devour our energy. While we think about that wonderful vacation, the moment quickly comes to an abrupt stop as we realize that we must finish our time sensitive interpretation project. The value of our life now boils down the quantity of work that we can produce in an hour of time.
As an Atlanta Translation worker, I believe that we must all sit back and critically evaluate how we spend our time and think about what is truly important in our lives. You are a slave to nobody and therefore you make your own choices. It is inescapable that some people will always have some control over the amount of anxiety that takes place in your life. However, everyone has some control-and probably more than they realize.