Many real estate agents invest too much time and too little urgency in their businesses. They commit well over 40 hours to the job, and they put themselves on call seven days a week. They spread themselves thin, and then, in order to sustain themselves over this endless schedule, they dilute their intensity.

I suggest that you commit right now to become more effective in way less time each week. Consider this advice:

Set aside at least one day a week to recharge and refresh yourself: Before you say you can't afford the day off, realize this truth: Work expands to fill the time you give it. Reduce your work hours, and you'll automatically squeeze more productivity into shorter spans of time.

Increase your productivity by increasing your intensity: Give yourself deadlines with no procrastination options. If you know you need to accomplish a lineup of goals over the course of a five-day workweek, your focus will automatically zoom in; you'll sweep away distractions, and you'll get the job done in the time allowed.

I watched my own focus and productivity intensify as I went from a seven-day workweek to a six-day workweek to a five-day workweek. The largest production increase I experienced, though, was when I moved to a schedule of four days of work followed by three days off, with no correlating reduction in my income or success objectives. Given my goals, I knew I had to work with incredibly high intensity and with no options for procrastination.

What's more, I couldn't change my mind and add a work day to my schedule because my wife, Joan, and I were constructing a vacation home some three hours away in Bend, Oregon, and we had to be on site every Friday to check the progress. Joan was the general contractor, so there was no reneging over the eight-month construction schedule. The amazing outcome? Once the home was done, I saw no need to revert to a five-day workweek.

Take away your time-wasting options: Commit to time off and force yourself to work during established, reasonable work hours. Automatically, you'll force yourself to eliminate time-wasting activities.

Give yourself no option to add hours back to your workweek: If you allow yourself the option to add time back to your workweek, you leave yourself open to time-wasting choices.

Begin to treat time as your most valuable asset: Realtors are too casual with their time, leading to career, relationship, or bank account casualties that could have been avoided by treating time as the most precious resource in life.

A resource is something that is available in a limited or finite supply: Money and energy are among your personal resources, but time is your most precious resource of all. You can judge your resource supply in all other areas. You know or can easily learn how much money is in your accounts. You know or sense your energy levels and what you have left to use. But there are no guarantees on the 86,400 seconds in each day. I defer absolute control of my time to the guy upstairs, and, in the meantime, I increase the probability of longevity through healthy eating, physical exercise, and adequate amounts of rest, and I increase the probably of productive use of my day through careful time management.