Too busy driving to get gas!

Do you ever feel like this? I remember doing this myself in my gifted education classroom to demonstrate to the kiddos the necessity of doing FIRST THINGS FIRST - making your priorities. We could translate this into homework, projects, assignments, sports and extracurricular activities as well, but somehow I always got lost in translation.

For the past school year, I was no longer teaching the 7 Habits to my 7th graders, and I missed having Franklin's words of wisdom remind me to "sharpen my saw."

And I felt like a salmon swimming upstream.

Add the little things that I never expected, such as caring for Wally while he was in the hospital, and helping my mother-in-law survive the after-effect of losing her life partner of 54 years, and diabetes control thrown in to my lap, and I didn't handle it as gracefully as this high-powered business woman made judgments as she thought out loud.

This video, shared by another colleague on Facebook, really was shared with me at a poignant time. I've been lounging around, feeling sorry for myself, thinking about catching up on all I've missed throughout the school year, as I often do, but just to extreme this summer.

My house is falling down around me, as it's been one of those little pebbles I tried to take care of first. My health is also falling down around me, as I tried to put out fires that came to me first, rather than fitting it in first which is what I should have been doing.

For anyone who has experienced burnout, this video will definitely set you on the straight and narrow path.

Whether or not I can master this philosophy, I don't know. But I'm sure willing to give it a try and go back to Covey's words of wisdom that I extolled to my own students.

How about yourself? What are your big rocks? What are the little pebbles that are getting in the way of you prioritizing your First Things First?