By Leland Pulley
A few years ago, my wife and I were taking a walk and a neighbor lady was out walking her dog. We began to converse with her and she made the statement that her life was so busy with things to do. In this case the lady is healthy, works part-time, has raised two kids, and her husband has a comfortable pension. They like us live in a neighborhood where our yards are maintained by the Homeowner=s Association. In looking at her life from our perspective, it appeared easy to manage and not filled with too many things to do. What do you think? Is your life like this lady?
So many people today talk about how busy they are. Perhaps you are one of these individuals and feel completely justified in making this statement. I too feel busy because I allow a lot of things into my life and get involved in many activities. However, there is a big difference between the demands of necessity in your life and merely being busy with things that you choose or want to do. Both ourselves and this neighbor lady have control of our lives and thus the use of our time, skills, money, and energy. For this reason, the statement that she is so busy, or I am busy, is merely a statement of convenience that people give as a reason for not getting involved in anything we do not desire. Often it becomes a reason or excuse for not associating with or helping specific individuals or getting involved in certain group efforts or activities.
It is true that some people have more responsibilities or duties than others. They truly are loaded with things to do and have a tight schedule. There are so many demands placed on them. Every hour of the workday, and even many hours away from work, are filled with things to do that they cannot easily get out of due to their jobs, basic family obligations, and civic responsibilities they have accepted. Some people have additional duties via their church. These people are busy, but not necessarily burdened down. They can fit into their schedules some things if they really want them bad enough.
For other individuals, it is not a matter of their lives being busy, but being harder to live. They have less resources to work with and more negative circumstances to live in. They have less skills and job training and thus a lower income. They may have less support in the family or more problems in the home. They could have physical or mental health problems, which hinder what they can do and how they feel when doing the routines of daily life. People working with these types of burdens, handicaps, or restrictions are probably more justified in making some excuses for what they can and cannot accomplish or do.
You decide if your life is busy and why. Here is something important to remember. For so many of us, the big issue is not whether we are busy, it is our priorities in life. The ability to set proper priorities, and then satisfy them, is the key to a life full of achievement and fulfillment.
Everyone must decide what is important to them, especially when they have the opportunity to choose. If you have limited resources, then you must put your priorities in harmony with these resources. What this means is simply this. Do not take upon yourself as many obligations, nor spend as much money, nor try to live like other people who have more resources than you. If you do, you will put additional pressure on yourself and feel more tired, frustrated, and always behind in your schedule. This is not good stewardship, nor the way to live. Instead you should have balance in your life. There should be harmony between what you can do and what you strive to do on a daily basis.
Look at some of the priorities in your life today. Do they make sense to you? Are you able to realistically work on all of them, or try to satisfy all of them at the present time? Perhaps you have too many priorities or the ones you have are not ranked in some type of order. For this reason, you are trying to do ten things at once instead of working on two or three things. Then when you are done with these, move on to another two or three things. Without some order and strategy, a lot of priorities merely add to mental strain and make you feel like you are not going to meet all your goals.
Even if you set some priorities in what you will do with your time, skills, money, and energy, you must recognize that these resources are limited in scope and must be distributed among all your responsibilities and activities. How you do this is up to you, but all of us must recognize that we have finite personal resources and therefore must learn to budget them wisely. Once we learn to do this, or make the effort to do this over time, the task becomes easier and we get better at it. We are able to recognize more clearly what we can or should do.
Here is something to remember about resource management. You do not have to do a great job in everything. For example, a supportive parent may feel the need to attend all the soccer games of a child. This is not necessary. Attend four or five games out of twelve, and you will show plenty of support. Then take the time saved and utilize it to do something with another child or your mate, or help a friend or neighbor, or study for a class you are taking.
In essence, make the effort in your life to set some goals. Determine why you seek each one. This will help you to set priorities for them. In the process, try to simplify everything as much as possible. Do not forget to allocate sufficient resources for each goal. Then move forward and accomplish or do the things you desire. When you live this way, you feel more in control. You are more relaxed. You feel much better about yourself and your life. This is why you are happier.
When utilized properly, priorities are a wonderful thing. But here is something to always keep in mind. Priorities in and of themselves are worthless unless they are implemented and followed. You must dedicate the resources necessary to carry them out. Otherwise, they are merely empty commitments or promises to yourself that send a negative message about your ability to run your life in an effective manner. Do not do this to yourself. Instead, let priorities bring order into your life and help you to focus on specific things until they are resolved or satisfied.
Going back to the conversation in our neighborhood between my wife and I and the neighbor lady, all three of us are busy. I have priorities in my life, but if something comes up unexpected, some adjustments are made. Priorities are shifted in order to make room for the unexpected incident or event or need that arises. I do not overload myself so there is not some flexibility in my life. I recognize that I have limited time, skills, money, and energy. I do not live in the idealistic world of what I want, but in the world of what I can realistically do or accomplish and enjoy. I am continually reviewing my priorities on a periodic basis and updating them as necessary so they are current and serve me or others for whom I have a responsibility or for whom I can help in some way.
I challenge you to look upon priorities as something positive in your life. They should work for you, and not you work for them. Be realistic as you set goals and determine priorities for each of them. Look for improvement in your ability to do this, and you will find it or recognize it over a period of time. Do not make excuses for yourself by merely saying to others, A I=m so busy A, when in fact this may be a cover-up for being a person without good priorities or clear ones, or a person who needs to be better organized, or someone who is wasting resources, or a person who lacks concern for others and takes little interest in their lives. Do what you can with what you have in an orderly fashion, and priorities will work for you and you will get more out of life. You will not feel that priorities are governing your life, or you work for them, because you are free to change them at any time and they are helping you get what you really want.
Good luck in your endeavors, and may priorities lighten your load and allow you to enjoy more of the things you desire.
Key Words – busy, control, schedule, demands, resources, priorities, obligations, good stewardship, order, strategy, goals, simplify, commitments, focus, adjustments, updating, realistic, organized
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