***Insight*** Getting Up

My life is going by pretty fast. I think I fully realized this when I started to read my license manual. I realized that my childhood had been pretty "quite", on the whole and that recently I have been pretty lazy. My priorities had shifted since the last time I decided to look at them. Homework, family time, recreation, exercise,video-games, art... all of these have been rearranged themselves and the new order that they're in, isn't helping me grow or making me happy.

Recently, I saw a visual lesson in one of my classes that just stuck with me. Up on a table there was a jar, a bowl of sugar, and a bowl of rocks; each rock had something written upon it such as "Family", "Friends," "Homework," "Videogames" ect. and their size was dependant upon what was written on them.

The object of the excersise was too put all of the sugar and all of the rocks in the jar. One volunteer stepped up and put his favorite things in there ("Friends," "Vidoegames," "Movies,") and then he started to put in the important ones ("Family," "Homework," "Reading"), but he couldn't fit those in because they were too big and there was not enough room; he tried to stack them. And when he tried to put the sugar in, it spilled everywhere and overflowed.

Then the teacher took everything out and showed us the right way to do it. She put the big rocks in first, then the smaller ones, which fit snuggly into place, and then poured in the sugar which went completely to the rim and filled all the empty spaces.

Afterwards the teacher said that the jar represented our lives, the rocks our priorites, and the sugar "the Sweet Stuff" like t.v. or going to Lagoon, taking naps, stuff like that.

That gave me a nice slap in the face. I need to wake up! I'm wasting time!

As of late, I have been going home and taking a nap, then playing videogames ("only and hour" I tell myselft but it is usually a lot more) then I eat dinner. After that its homework (that I know I can't put off until tommorrow morning like I usually do) and then once it's nice and late I read my scriptures. In one evening I have unknowingly, and yet purposely, elimanted family-time, excersise (which just KILLS me to know I haven't done), and some of my homework which I choose to do at the eleventh hour. Why do I take the naps? Because I'm tired because I put my homework off! Why do I play my videogames for so long? Because if offers me an escape because I feel miserable because I put my homework off!

It's a vicous cycle and there is ONE person to blame...me. This isn't healthy! This isn't fun; and as of now I choose to stop this once and for all.

I wasn't stacking my jar right but I fully intend to now! And I might as well admit it, I was one of those people who has been putting off their Honors English reading.

It's time for a change, I'm ready to go back to the person I used to be. That me was happy, and a full 4.0 student. This one is lazy, ill, and puts a half-hearted effort into things. 1st term I got a 3.95 and the one after that I got a 4.0. That is still WAY short of what I want, but it is fully what I deserve for what I put out.

**In closing I say this: You can't gain ANYTHING without giving up something else in return, including time and effort. Take care of your priorites first. All the "sweet stuff" will fall into place. You just have to trust yourself and learn to seize the day.**