Over the holidays I collected three interesting links regarding time, a.k.a life, expenditure.
Paul Graham takes a high level view of procrastination and how to avoid it, even lauding some forms of putting things off. Aaron Swartz takes a different tack, digging in to the dirty details of procrastination in an effort to be more productive. They both have some good points, but tend towards M.I.T. genius influenced "look for the homerun pitch and swing away".
Scott Berkun zags. Look to passionately make a small difference, let it drive you, and wait for a snowball. At worst you still feel good about what you've done.
The varied philosophies aren't incompatible, but the third seems much more attainable by mere mortals.