Priorities

I’ve been wondering a great deal about priorities lately.  When I was in my twenties, my priorities were simple: work, family, friends, me.  In that order.  Work was everything, just as school had been everything before that.  I thought about it all the time and, since I spent most of my waking hours there, I was doing work most of the time.  And then, a little man named Lucas came into my life and everything changed.

Becoming a parent was a difficult transition for me, I will admit.  But priorities finally shifted and Lucas became the first priority.  Even if there were times I did not show it and it appeared like work remained the first priority, the reason for work was to make the money I needed in order to support my son.  So, rather than being an enjoyable activity, it became a burden and a source of fear.  What if I lost my job?  What would we do?  So, I obsessed over work to the point that my husband wanted to throw my Blackberry out the window of our car while we were driving somewhere on vacation.

Yes, vacation.

Finally, I got my priorities straight.  Here they are, in order: me, Lucas & Douglas, family, friends, school, work.  Again, I know some might think that these are not in the right order, based on how I might act.  They probably think that school is higher on the list.  It isn’t.  It’s a means to an end, although very enjoyable.  It’s how I will finally enter into my chosen vocation: teaching.  And that means that it is part of taking care of me.

If I don’t take care of myself, how can I possibly take care of anyone else?  If I don’t rely on others, such as my husband, to help me with Lucas, how can I take care of myself?  (And the same goes for him, by the way; he needs to put himself first too.)

It’s taken a few years, with the support of my husband, to get to a place where I finally feel like I have some balance in my life, especially where priorities are concerned.  It’s not perfect, but it’s the best I can do right now.

What are your priorities?