A young ensign had nearly completed his first overseas tour of duty when he was given the opportunity to prepare his ship to “set sail.” With a stream of crisp commands, he had the decks buzzing with sailors and soon the ship churned slowly out of the channel.

The ensign’s efficiency was remarkable. In fact, the talk was that he had set a new record for getting the ship underway.

But his captain was not as pleased. A message delivered to the young officer read, “My personal congratulations upon completing your underway preparation exercise according to the book and with amazing speed. But next time, you might wait until your captain is aboard before setting off.”

What good is a ship without the captain? The ensign did all the right things, but he never did the most important thing.

It is a matter of priorities. I know that I may accomplish a great deal every day. I may do the right things, but am I doing the best things? To borrow language from author Stephen Covey, do I put first things first?

I once saw this demonstration made to an audience. A large, clear jar was filled with coffee beans almost to the top. The beans, we were told, represent all of the activities we accomplish in a day. Then, two golf balls were produced. These represented a couple of the truly important things in our lives.  Think of the golf balls as time spent with a significant person, such as a family member, or doing something special for somebody else, or developing your spiritual life or just beginning that project you keep putting off. The balls were then placed on top of the beans then was an attempt to screw on the lid. It couldn’t be done. There were too many beans in the jar.

“Does this remind you of a typical day?” we were asked. “We’re so busy doing the usual we can’t seem to squeeze in anything else.”

The speaker then emptied the jar and started over. “But what if we put first things first? What if we start each day doing something special, something we truly WANT to do? The golf balls were placed into the jar first. Then the coffee beans were poured in.  They fell neatly around the balls and filled the jar to the top. And, then the lid fit perfectly.

And that’s the secret to building the kind of life you want. I’ve discovered that if I can begin every day with one or two things that are important to me, the other stuff still fits into place just fine.

I don’t want to just do all of the RIGHT things and never get around to the BEST things. And I certainly don’t want my life summed up in the sentence, “Daddy has gone to another meeting.” So I handle the golf balls first. And in comparison, everything else is just beans.

And that’s something you can hang your hat on.

– Steve Goodier