What is your “Urgent”, and what is your “Important” stuff? And do you take mindful time for it?
It’s not always easy to make the difference between important and urgent things. Usually the urgent matters relate to what other people expect from you, and they do have to be done,… like replying to a clients e-mail, doing your laundry, paying your taxes… These urgent things are also usually to be found in your e-mailbox and in your snailmail box : they’re other people’s to do list. Also the FOMO, the Fear Of Missing Out, make us pay more attention to “Urgent” instead of to “Important”. Like checking Facebook notifications, blogpost comments,… If we let ourselves be submerged by all this “urgent” stuff first thing in the morning, the day will be over (or our energy will be gone!) before we can get to the “Important” things !
Important things are more quiet : they are your personal priorities to go there where you want to go. They are your dreams… They need us to have energy to make us want to do them. They don’t come beeping in the Facebook notifications and nobody e-mails you for them. Resistance and “urgent things” often make us blow them off. So we need to take time to figure out what matters most to us and we should make time in our busy schedules for it. Work on what’s Important first and save what’s urgent for a little bit later, when you have less energy! Don’t let social media eat up all your time and energy.
Time is so precious! Time is rare! It’s probably the most precious thing we have… So how do you want to spend your time? Do you now the story about the “Big Rocks” in life by Dr Stephen Covey?
Here it is:
“One day an expert was speaking to a group of business students about time management. As this man stood in front of the group of high-powered over-achievers he said, “Okay, time for a quiz.” Then he pulled big jar and set it on a table in front of him. Then he produced about a dozen fist-sized rocks and carefully placed them, one at a time, into the jar.
When the jar was filled to the top and no more rocks would fit inside, he asked, “Is this jar full?” Everyone in the class said, “Yes.” Then he said, “Really?” He reached under the table and pulled out a bucket of gravel. Then he dumped some gravel in and shook the jar causing pieces of gravel to work themselves down into the spaces between the big rocks.
Then he smiled and asked the group once more, “Is the jar full?” By this time the class was onto him. “Probably not,” one of them answered. “Good!” he replied. And he reached under the table and brought out a bucket of sand. He started dumping the sand in and it went into all the spaces left between the rocks and the gravel. Once more he asked the question, “Is this jar full?”
“No!” the class shouted. Once again he said, “Good!” Then he grabbed a pitcher of water and began to pour it in until the jar was filled to the brim. Then he looked up at the class and asked, “What is the point of this illustration?”
One eager beaver raised his hand and said, “The point is, no matter how full your schedule is, if you try really hard, you can always fit some more things into it!”
“No,” the speaker replied, “that’s not the point. The truth this illustration teaches us is: If you don’t put the big rocks in first, you’ll never get them in at all.””
So what are your big rocks in life? My big rocks are my family, my friends, my art, drawing, painting, my job, my working out… But I noticed from myself that sometimes I’m overwhelmed and I don’t fully commit to it and don’t fully enjoy it. I’m overwhelmed by non important stuff like e-mails, social media, my phone, my computer, noise from outside, or negative thoughts…
“It’s not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it” [Seneca] We waste it on Facebook, Instagram, gossip,…. by the Fear of Missing Out… and because it’s instant pleasure and addictive.
Your time is more valuable then anything else in life, and the future is uncertain, so we have to live fully immediately. Live in the moment and have a good time NOW with your big rocks 🙂
Here’s a beautiful video I want to share with you.
Love,
Barbara