Why “I Don’t Have Time” Is Rarely About Time
Sep 18, 2026TL;DR: “I don’t have time” sounds like a scheduling problem, but often the calendar is revealing what has already been prioritized. Nicole Hollar, behavior change keynote speaker and integrative life coach, looks at what we’re choosing instead, why we may resist naming that choice, and when a time problem is really asking for a more honest look at what matters.
The Excuse That Sounds Like a Fact
“I don’t have time” gets said about the gym, the annual physical, the difficult conversation with a coworker, the strategic project that never gets touched, the friend you keep meaning to call back. It sounds neutral. Factual, even. Like a weather report.
It isn’t. It’s a conclusion dressed up as a constraint. And most people never check whether the conclusion is really true, because “I don’t have time” is one of the few excuses nobody is allowed to challenge. Try telling someone their time complaint is suspicious and watch how fast the conversation gets uncomfortable.
Everyone Has the Same Number of Hours
You already know this, which is exactly why it’s worth saying plainly: the person who trains for a marathon at 5 a.m. has the same 24 hours as the person who says they can’t find 20 minutes to walk. The founder who somehow has time for date night has the same calendar as the one who tells their spouse there’s nothing left to give. Time isn’t the variable. Priority is.
This is the tension underneath a lot of stuck behavior: what’s familiar keeps winning by default, while what would actually be fulfilling stays theoretical. Staying busy with the familiar version of your day is easier than admitting you’ve organized your life around something you are no longer consciously choosing.
What’s Actually Driving It: Values, Not Minutes
In Feeling Stuck? Empower Yourself to Live a Happier, More Fulfilling Life, I wrote that values are beliefs that become the pillars of how you lead your life, not abstract ideals. They are the things you organize your behavior around, whether you’ve named them or not. When something you claim to value keeps losing to something you’ve never named, that’s not a scheduling failure. That’s a values conflict you haven’t looked at directly.
Some values are what the book calls threshold values — the ones that, when unmet, eventually force a decision: you leave, you change the situation, or you stay and quietly resent it. “I don’t have time” is frequently the sound of someone avoiding that decision. It’s easier to blame the clock than to admit you value being seen as reliable more than you value your own health, or that you value avoiding conflict more than you value the relationship a hard conversation could potentially improve.
A Better Question Than “How Do I Find More Time?”
Try this instead: What would I have to say “no” to, on purpose, to make room for this? If the honest answer is “nothing, I genuinely have no margin,” that’s useful information. It’s a real capacity problem, not a values problem. But for most people, the honest answer involves a specific thing they don’t want to say “no” to: being the go-to person at work, avoiding an uncomfortable ask, staying in the identity of someone who’s simply too busy for this. That specificity is the whole point. It’s much harder to keep hiding behind “no time” once you can name exactly what you’re protecting instead.
It’s Not Just a Health Thing
This shows up constantly at work. The manager who “doesn’t have time” to delegate is usually protecting control or the feeling of being indispensable. The employee who “doesn’t have time” for the strategic project is often avoiding the risk of being evaluated on something that isn’t routine. And in relationships, “I don’t have time to talk about this” is rarely about minutes — it’s about not wanting to have the conversation at all. Or what about the parent who doesn’t have time to eat better, yet finds a way to ensure their kid has exactly what they need — be it a cooked meal or a last minute costume for school. In this last example, the parent’s needs are simply not as important as the kid’s needs, or they don’t want to feel like they’ve failed as a parent.
The Point Isn’t to Feel Guilty
None of this is an argument for cramming more into your day or feeling bad about your calendar. It’s an argument for accuracy. “I don’t have time” and “I haven’t made this a priority” are different sentences, and only one of them tells you anything you can truly work with. Once you get honest about what is really happening you bring choice back to you.
Questions for Reflection
- Think of one thing you regularly say you “don’t have time for.” What would you have to say “no” to, on purpose, to make room for it?
- Whose priorities are currently filling the time you claim is missing, and did you choose that, or did it happen by default?
- If time were never actually the obstacle, what would you have to admit is the real one?
Frequently Asked Questions
Is “I don’t have time” always an excuse?
No. Real capacity limits exist: caregiving, health crises, financial survival, and genuine overload are not values problems. The distinction worth making is between a hard constraint and a soft one: if the constraint would disappear the moment something with a higher priority was on the other side of it, it was never really about time.
What’s the difference between not having time and not making something a priority?
Not having time means there is no available capacity, period, regardless of what’s offered in exchange. Not making something a priority means the capacity exists, but something else — comfort, avoidance, an unnamed value — is currently winning. Most people discover it’s the second one once they get specific about what they’d have to give up.
How do I figure out what I actually value versus what I think I should value?
Start by looking at where your time and energy already go without a fight — that’s usually a more honest indicator than what you’d list if asked. A values check, as described in Feeling Stuck?, involves identifying what matters most in a specific area of your life, ranking it, and being honest about what those labels actually mean to you, rather than assuming everyone defines “fun” or “success” or “freedom” the same way you do.