For more than three decades, my friend John and I have shared lunch once or twice a month. From our 30s into our 60s. Through our children’s births into their adulthood. From being new lawyers learning our craft to him phasing into retirement. He is a dear, valued friend to whom I’d give a kidney in a second.

John is now nearly 68. Some months ago at lunch, he gave a brilliant monologue about a phrase I have heard, and said, many times: “Spending your time.” The genesis of his remarks was contemplation of a medical procedure.

“Will this impact my life expectancy?” he asked his physician. “No,” his doctor responded, “At 68, your life expectancy is still six to 12 years.”

John nearly fell out of his chair. Six to 12 years! When he got home from the doctor’s appointment, he started looking at his life through the filter of how to spend that time.

Spend — diminishing a finite asset, usually associated with money.

Your — a life, years, months, days, hours, minutes and seconds, that are personally and uniquely yours.

Time — those moments we have with good health and mental acuity that do not diminish in any way our ability to participate, enjoy and appreciate the activities we choose.

John’s self-evaluation revealed a lot of wasted time. “Unwise spending,” he called it. Time with people he didn’t really enjoy, obligatory relationships more than relationships of choice, time used on efforts he felt compelled to do, not what he would have chosen.

His analysis of his time management — life management, his new filter, has given John great freedom to choose how to spend the rest of his time. He possesses a sense of independence he had not felt before. He controls his life, his time, and doles it out — spends it — as he, and only he, determines.

Recently, I asked John what he had learned in viewing his life through the how-do-you-want-to-spend-your-time filter, how he had changed his life. John noted that he had distanced himself from three particular acquaintances. The first, he realized, never asked him a question. Conversations were more monologues than dialogues. His “friend” was the professor in every conversation, he to be the student and learn from the shared wisdoms conveyed in each lecture.

A second acquaintance always diminishes his stories. If John mentioned, for example, “I just climbed Mount Everest. It was hard, but a great adventure,” she’d say something like “Don’t about 300 people climb Everest each year? It can’t be that hard.” My friend determined that he’d been minimalized long enough.

The third acquaintance, despite years of acquaintanceship, knew little about John because there was no particular interest.

Living his life without these three people in it has given John more time to spend with positive, interested people. His life is fuller, his time spent better.

Perhaps each of us should reflect on how we spend our time, and make sure our moments are shared with those who care about us, not lecture to us.

I am proud to say my 68-year-old friend and I still have lunches together. Spending our time as we choose. Once or twice a month, sharing a meal with each other.

Copyright Jeff Tolman 2015. All rights reserved.

— Jeff Tolman is a lawyer in Poulsbo and a periodic contributor to the North Kitsap Herald.