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Why “Finding More Time” Doesn’t Solve Overwhelm for Busy Women

  • 7 days ago
  • 5 min read


Many women say the same thing when we talk about wellbeing: “I know I should prioritise myself more… I just don’t have the time.”


At first glance, this seems like the obvious issue. Work responsibilities, family commitments, and life administration can easily fill an entire week. When life feels full, the logical solution appears simple: find more time.


But research suggests something a little different. Simply increasing the amount of time available does not reliably lead to greater progress, wellbeing, or personal development. What tends to matter much more is how time is structured and prioritised.


Understanding why can help explain why wellbeing often feels difficult to maintain in real life.



Why More Time Often Gets Filled


There is a well-known idea in organisational psychology sometimes referred to as Parkinson’s Law — the observation that work expands to fill the time available for it.


Although the idea began as a satirical comment about bureaucracy, later experiments examining time allocation have shown a similar pattern. When people are given more time to complete tasks, they often take longer, even when the task itself hasn’t changed. The extra time rarely improves the quality of the outcome in proportion to the time spent.


In everyday life, this means that spare time rarely stays empty for long. Existing tasks expand, or new ones appear to fill the space. For many women balancing multiple roles, this can feel very familiar. Even when a small window opens up in the week, other responsibilities tend to move into it almost immediately.



The Planning Fallacy: Why We Think Next Week Will Be Different


Another psychological tendency helps explain why this pattern repeats. Research by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky identified what is known as the planning fallacy, our tendency to underestimate how long things will take, even when we have past experience suggesting otherwise.


When we think about the week ahead, we often imagine the best-case version of it. We assume tasks will go smoothly, interruptions will be minimal, and everything will take roughly the amount of time we hope it will.


In reality, life is rarely that predictable. Unexpected tasks appear. Things take longer than expected. Responsibilities overlap. This is one reason people often believe that freeing up time will solve the problem. In theory, it looks like there will be space. In practice, that space tends to fill with additional commitments that seemed manageable at the time.



The Role of Mental Load


Time pressure is also shaped by something less visible: mental load. Mental load refers to the ongoing thinking required to keep life running. It includes remembering responsibilities, anticipating needs, organising logistics, and mentally keeping track of everything that needs to happen next.

Much of this work happens quietly in the background.


Research in behavioural economics shows that when people experience scarcity — including time scarcity, their attention naturally narrows toward immediate demands. Under these conditions, the mind prioritises urgent tasks and immediate responsibilities.


This means that even when time becomes available, it is often absorbed by the most pressing or familiar tasks rather than longer-term priorities like wellbeing or personal development. In other words, the challenge is not always the number of hours available. It is the pressure surrounding those hours.



Why “Just Add Wellbeing” Often Doesn’t Work


Much wellbeing advice unintentionally assumes that people have spare time waiting to be organised.

Suggestions often focus on adding routines, scheduling self-care, or introducing new daily habits. But when someone is already carrying a significant mental load, these suggestions can feel like one more responsibility.


Instead of reducing pressure, they can quietly increase it. This helps explain why many women say they feel they can't add wellbeing practices to their week, even when they genuinely want to prioritise them.

In reality, the approach itself may not fit the reality of their lives.



What Research Suggests Actually Helps


Research looking at time management strategies offers a useful insight here. Across multiple studies and meta-analyses, the factor that seems to make the biggest difference is not the number of hours available, but how those hours are structured.


Research analysing time management strategies in education consistently finds that practices such as prioritisation, planning, and goal alignment are associated with improvements in performance, engagement, and confidence. Importantly, these improvements often happen without increasing the amount of time available.


Studies examining academic performance show a similar pattern. Students who actively prioritise tasks, plan their work, and manage distractions tend to perform better than those who simply spend more hours studying. The key difference is not effort alone. It is an intentional structure.



A Different Starting Point: Clarity


For women balancing competing responsibilities, this research points to a different starting point.

Rather than trying to find more time, it can be more helpful to begin with clarity.


Questions such as:

  • What genuinely needs my attention this week?

  • Which responsibilities are mine to protect?

  • Which tasks could be delayed, simplified, or shared?


When responsibilities and priorities become clearer, something interesting often happens. The mental load begins to ease. Not because life suddenly becomes less busy, but because the mind is no longer trying to hold every responsibility at once.



Creating Space Without Finding More Time


The idea that wellbeing activities requires large blocks of free time can feel discouraging. But research on time management suggests that meaningful change often begins with something much simpler: how we organise the time that already exists.


When priorities are clearer and responsibilities are structured more deliberately, people often find that small but meaningful spaces naturally begin to appear. Not because new hours appeared in the week, but because their attention and energy are being directed more intentionally. In that sense, wellbeing intentions are less about finding time and more about designing how time is used.





A Practical Place to Start


If this idea resonates with you, a helpful starting point is simply understanding where your time is currently being absorbed.


The Time-Finders Blueprint is designed to help you do exactly that. It guides you through a simple process to identify where time and energy are being used, where mental load may be building, and where small adjustments could help create space for what matters most.


It’s not about adding more tasks to your week.


It’s about reclaiming time intentionally so your wellbeing has room to exist within real life.

Download the Time-Finders Blueprint




Explore This Topic Further


If you want a structured, supportive space to apply these ideas in practice, the Women’s Wellbeing Lab offers psychology-informed tools designed to support improved wellbeing in real-life conditions.


Inside the Lab, you’ll find psychology-informed tools designed to help you understand what’s driving how you feel, organise competing demands, and respond with intention rather than reaction.


Bring this knowledge to your decision-making and coaching sessions to make faster progress toward your goals.




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