Planning Accordingly

Recently, I've started using a new type of day planner that Donal Miller came out with a couple of years ago.  It had gathered dust until just the other day when I got it out and am starting to use it for the first time.  It really helps you put things in perspective by asking a question.

Many day planners ask you to make your to-do list and prioritize accordingly.  That is a great and productive way to work and this planner does the same.  When you fill out each day though there is something that makes a significant difference to me at least.  It starts with the question, 'If you were to live today over again, what would you do differently?'  It's taken from the research of Victor Frankl.  He would ask his patients this question, I think the only difference was he would do it over a lifetime.

Let me clarify, the idea is to think about you at the end of your day.  Start out first thing in the morning and picture the end of the day.  If you could live today over again, what would you do differently?  We get caught up in the details of every day and forget what's really important. 

By now we've all heard one of the most common regrets of people on their deathbeds is that they wished they would've spent more time with family and friends rather than spending so much time at work.  We hear that and for a day or maybe a week if we're lucky we start seeing things through a new perspective.  We realize we need to spend more time with our kids instead of being so stressed about our living spaces being clean for guests.  We start realizing it's okay to leave work at work and not everything is going to be finished at the end of each day.  We realize friends and family need our presence more than our presents and so we give them a call to catch up on each other's lives.

If you're anything like me though, that usually doesn't last too awful long.  Daily pressures start coming to the forefront of our minds again and we forget our priorities and where we need to spend more of our time.  We become consumed in our work and neglect our physical and mental health.  We think our work is what makes us important and it becomes an idol or rather we become our own idol.  We forget that God is God, and we are not.  We forget to relish in the fact that we are His children and that's enough.