I heard a story once about a professor giving an object lesson to his class.  It goes something like this:

There was a professor at a University that decided to give his class an object lesson.  Once the class had begun he brought out an empty glass jar.  The sleepy students wondered what this would be about.  They watched him put several large rocks into the glass jar, then he asked them a simple question, “Is the jar full?”  Looking at the jar there was no way you would be able to get another large stone into it so, some students murmured, “It looks full.” 

Next the professor took smaller stones and started to fill in the empty spaces until he could no longer fit anymore small stones. He asked again, “Is the jar full?”  This time the students were starting to become more alert and engaged.  A few said, “Yes!”  While others said, “No!” 

The professor then took fine grains of sand and started to fill up the jar.  After the sand filled the jar to the brim he asked, “Is the Jar full?”  At this point the class was pretty interested in what was going on.  Yes, and no was being yelled throughout the classroom. 

Finally, he poured water into the jar until the jar was truly full.  At this point he told the class that life was like the empty jar.  Then he asked them, “what did you learn from this object lesson?”  The majority seemed to agree that the object lesson taught that you can always put more in.  So in life, no matter how busy you are, you can always fit in more things.  He replied that might be true, but the correct object lesson here was that you will only get the large stones into the jar if you put them in first. 

The large stones represent what is really important in life.  If family is really important in your life, then don’t wait to put them in till the end, because they won’t fit.  So make sure the things that are really important get first priority in your life.

I think this is a critical issue for us to consider.  Jobs and careers are important, but are they the most important?  Are they the only things that fit into your glass jar?  It seems that sometimes we let our jobs/careers control us instead of the other way around.  Why is it that many of us have trouble using all our vacation time in a year?  Why do our families, hobbies, relationships, other interests seem to fall by the wayside as we work long hours/weekends etc.?  So I challenge you to think through what is truly important in your life.  No doubt work is important as are meeting deadlines, but we need to have balance and fit in the things that have lasting value and importance.  When we aren’t intentional with our priorities, sometimes we are left with a full jar and no place/time for those things that really matter.

Share what is most important to you and how you make sure it gets into the glass jar (your life) first?