I swear, 3/4 of the effort goes into coming up with a title that I think is witty enough to grab someone’s attention, that or is something I find pleasing in it’s final form. The idea for this blog entry has been kicking around in my head for a good week or so, but when I came here to write it, I labored over the title for a half hour until I thought it was just right. Which means, if you don’t like it, don’t tell me!

Priorities are strange little things, or big things, depending on what it is, and they can direct us or derail us. We spend a lot of time when we are younger hearing about how we have to get our priorities straight, or being asked what our priorities even are for that matter, but how can we even know what our priorities are?

If you had asked me back in high school what my priorities were, I probably would have said get into college, graduate, get a decent job, and get a life going for me wherever I wound up. I did some of those things, and I am still working on parts of it, so maybe I didn’t get them straight after all.

That isn’t what started me thinking about priorities though, no it was more along the lines of realizing I am not anyone’s priority, not in the way you see played out before you in the fictional and real worlds. Once I settled in on that notion I began to wonder if I was even my own priority, something that I have been working on this year is, well, me.

I think a lot of my life has been spent making other people my priority so that I could feel good, and not have to focus on my own things as much. At the same time, it was easy when I was still in school as well, because I could always make that a priority and then you’re technically working on yourself, so it was a double win. That’s not been a possibility for me for a while now, and I think it is becoming more and more clear.

I have important people in my life, people I know I am important to as well, but they have lives, jobs, families, responsibilities, and that is why I am not their priority, nor should I be. This is where my past comes back to me, and I have to settle into a new pattern where I mirror my important people, in that I keep them important, but I make me the priority.

Me? Who is he? What does making me a priority even mean?

As I have thought on it and compared it to what I am doing currently, I can see aspects of the actions I need to take, so I will start from there.

I am working on being more active, and thoughtful about what I eat, because I know my physical well being is important in the present and in the future. Right now I need it so that I feel good, and get back some of that confidence I might have lost along the way. I need it for the future for when I have someone in my life that becomes a priority, and for when I may have a family that is one as well.

I am trying to read and write more, because I know my mind needs the exercise much like my body does. Making this a priority is not just so I can seem like I know everything, but also because I told myself long ago that the day I quit learning is the day I die.

I am trying to be more present as well. I started to look around and see that I keep a future idea of a life and it has caused me not to live as much right now. I don’t want to live in my hometown all my life, so I keep the dream of living somewhere in front of me, which is good but it made me avoid some things because I thought it would be easier. I can tell I have avoided things because when I do go out of town, that’s when I feel more alive, and I know it is because I am present there. I am actually putting myself into my surroundings and interactions, much more thoroughly than I do here, and that is just dumb.

These are some of the things that come to mind when I look at making myself a priority.

These are a few of the things that tell me there is much more I can do to accomplish this task.

These are a few of the things that tell me to wake up and be alive.

I know I will always be a work in progress, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t be open and available while working. See, there’s another aspect of the priority shift, don’t let your own fixer upper status get in the way of what can be extraordinary (and ordinary) experiences!

We get one trip down here, put yourself at the top of your list of people and things to focus on.

Take me time.

Keep others close and make them important, but don’t lose sight of yourself.

Try to be your best, and failing that, just try.

Maybe you aren’t someone else’s priority, but don’t look at that as a negative thing, because really it isn’t.

We all have to take good care of ourselves, because sometimes we can lose track of where exactly our focus is or should be, and if you aren’t taking care of yourself, it is a hell of a lot harder to figure out where you are.

What are your priorities?

Right now I am getting better at being at the top of my list, and I hope you are doing the same!