First Things First

On my desk, I have 3 fairly large beach stones.  They are all various shades of grey: one slightly darker than the others, one is a very light grey and the other almost white with speckles of grey.  These stones were collected on one of our family vacations to Cape Cod.  When I see and touch them I can almost taste the salt spray, feel the warm sunshine on my skin and smell the sea air mingled with white pine.

The stones are a reminder of something I heard in a speech a long time ago.  The speaker attributed this analogy to the late  Steve Covey.  Basically, the idea is this-  if you had a mason jar and a pile of large stones, smaller stones, pebbles, sand and water in what order would you fill the jar so that all the material would fit?  Would you put in the water first, add the sand, the pebbles, smaller stones and then the larger stones last?  

The only way that all of it would fit is if you first put in the big stones and then the next smaller size until you added all the solid material and then poured the water in on top.  The point being that one needs to do what is important first and then the rest will follow.

The 3 stones on my desk are a reminder of what is important to me: faith, family and friends. It is a daily review of priorities in my life and a reminder to fill it with "first things first". Everyday I can get pulled in so many directions and asked to do so many things- work, co-workers, family, extended family, church, neighbors, social engagements, school, etc.  Even seemingly good things can become burdensome when I have no boundaries or limits.   When I try to fit everything in I  can become overwhelmed and feel that nothing fits.  I feel frustrated that those things that I want to do get pushed out of the way by other things. 

I would encourage each one of you to decide what is important in your life.  Is it family, career, health, travel, friends, etc?  Write down all the things that are important to you and really spend time mulling over that list.  If it would be helpful, number them from #1-#whatever.  Try and make a priority to daily fill your life with those things that are meaningful to you.  During different seasons of our lives, the big stones might shift and change and we may find that which was important in one season no longer has the high priority.   That is okay.  Just recognize that every day we should try and do the "first things first".