Thursday, October 13, 2005

Object lesson


I remember an object lesson I saw as a child in church. The teacher had a bag of sand and a bag of pebbles.
His goal was to put the sand and the pebbles in a mason jar.
In his first attempt he poured the sand in the jar and then tried to fit in the pebbles, of course, they didn’t fit.
Emptying the sand out of the jar, he next put in the pebbles, then again poured the sand in the jar. This time, it all fit in the jar perfectly well.
The object of this lesson is if you take care of the big things first, the small things will fit in around the corners.
Sadly, though the object lesson impressed me, I have followed the advice with limited success.
I usually manage to get the biggest pebbles in my jar. I hit my deadlines and send my children to school in clean clothes.
But the sand and the smaller pebbles trickle away sometimes half-done, often not un-done as I busy myself with the fine art of stalling.
So many things are more interesting than paying bills. Laundry, bleck, it doesn’t matter if I do it today or tomorrow, there’s always a fresh supply. Cooking, ho hum, I’d really rather not, thank you.
I think perhaps the greatest stumbling block in my life is the inability to put the big pebbles in my jar first. It’s so easy to fritter my day with minutia, bogged down in the sand of life.
So my goal for the rest of the year is to get a grip on time management, figure out which of the big pebbles must go in the jar, and cut down on the amount of sand I send through the hourglass.
Any suggestions?

2 comments:

karen said...

Story of my life! Time management and I do battle often.

I wish I had some useful suggestions for you. But, really I could use some myself. (as long as hanging out on the computer stays in the plan!:)

Cindy Lee said...

I have a question - who decides what the "pebbles" and "sand" represent??? You or society? just something to ponder......love ya, Cindy Lee