How To Prioritize
We all have days, weeks, or months where everything is asking for our immediate attention. In a domino effect of problems, one thing goes out of place, and the rest all fall in sequence with no interlude in between. Everything, everywhere, all at once catches fire. Confetti of problems raining down.
Murphy’s law of Anything that can go wrong will go wrong forgot to mention that it all goes wrong at once. Your phone dies, a project hits a bump, favorite sneakers decide they want to be sandals, people need your help, and your relationship goes into limbo concurrently. A day scripted by an archnemesis ( I wish I had one).
When everything around you is going up in flames, it is better to just let things burn. Yes, let the fire rage on. Not everything needs your immediate attention. You can’t quench every flame. Trying to do so is like sharing a lollipop with five friends, you all got some however, it was as good as nothing. It barely makes a difference. Without focused attention on a single blaze, you are basically a shower head instead of a fire hose trying to put out a fire. In the end, nothing makes it out.
It’s easy to say all you have to do is prioritize what is urgent and important. So I will say it. You have to prioritize what is urgent and important to you. In practice, everything feels urgent and important. But you don’t want to be that firefighter who jumps into a blaze without assessing if it is worth fighting. Let things burn a bit as you orient yourself and double down on where you have the most control of the result, things you can control. Get comfortable hearing fires rage around you. Because at any given time something is burning but is it worth fighting now.
Thank you for reading, and let some fires burn on.
