Beginning With Time

Like any organizational improvement in life, better time management brings relief from stress, better focus on important things and greater calm and peace in your life. While we each have 168 hours a week, those who have learned how to use them to the fullest enjoy more time for the most important things and for the less-important, often more fun things.

What are your priorities? Those things need to be done first and foremost. Dallin H. Oaks counseled, "We have to forego some good things in order to choose others that are better or best because they develop faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and strengthen our families." Fill in the circles with what you feel are the most important uses of your time. Now, compare them with your actual planner. Do you spend your time doing what is best or most important? Or do you spend more of your time on "good" things and "better" things, and never quite find time for the "best" things? "I think most of us intuitively understand how important the fundamentals are. It is just that we sometimes get distracted by so many things that seem more enticing," said Dieter F. Uchtdorf.

Priorities can change from time to time in our lives (and from person to person), so periodically examining your priorities and adjusting what is in each circle is helpful. Couples who share priorities will feel that they are in greater partnership, can understand and help one another succeed and achieve greater things in their own lives and as couples and families.

Knowing your priorities can also help you to stay on track and provide clear-cut "yes"es and "no"es to the many options that clamor for our time. For example, your friends invite you to do something that is really fun, and you don't want to disappoint them. But it falls in your outer circle of priorities and doing that thing will mean that several things in your "better" and "best" circle will suffer. Easy decision. And hopefully (and usually) taking care of those best things will allow for some "good" fun, too.