If…

personal priorities take time

and…

time is money

then…

our priorities should be worth something to us.

Shouldn’t they?

But how many times a day do we let other people’s priorities take over our schedule? Any why do we let it happen?

Saying “no” to someone is never easy, but it can oftentimes be a necessary element to making progress.

If we want our business to grow a particular direction, we might have to decline opportunities from certain customers in order to really focus on where it is we want to go.

If we want to run a marathon, we might have to start going to bed earlier so we can wake up earlier and get a run in before work. Or turn down social outings on the weekend to complete a 20 miler.

If we want to stay on a budget and start working our way out of debt, we’ll have to pass on “unbelievable” store sales and reign in our spending on categories that may not really be necessary.

Unfortunately, nothing will ever be obtained for “free”…including our own priorities. But starting to defend them with our actions (i.e. saying “no” to other things) is the first payment we have to make on the journey to accomplishing our goals.

If we don’t truly make something a priority for ourselves, few others will either.