Emergency Living
There are times, when I am driving in my car being passed by so
many other cars speeding along, that I could swear there is an
emergency somewhere and I wasn't invited. It seems everyone is
in a hurry to get somewhere. The other day I was sitting at a
red light, the light turned green and the car in front of me
sped away. At the next traffic light the same car was sitting in
front of me and, when the light turned green, off the car sped.
This went on for three lights. I must say that I was rather
amused that this speed demon only seemed to be speeding to a red
light, and wasn't getting any further along than I was. In life,
this same phenomenon can happen. Going faster doesn't mean we
will get where we are going any sooner. We just burn more
energy, or gas if we are in the car, than we would if we went at
a much safer speed.
I am reminded of Stephen Covey's quadrants. Tasks are classified
as important, but not urgent or important and urgent. Most
things don't fall into the important and urgent quadrant. In
fact, few things do, but many of us operate out of that
quadrant. We treat everything like it is an emergency, and we
rush around putting out fires that don't exist. The problem with
treating everything like an emergency is, when we really have
one, we might not recognize it or we will be so burned out that
we won't be able to deal with it properly.
If you are not sure whether you are emergency living here is a
list of signs: - You are consistently five to ten minutes late -
Clutter has become a way of life - You are either in "hurry up"
or "catch up" mode - You consistently forget things and misplace
things - You ran out of patience a long time ago - You take
pride in how much you can do - You consider multi-tasking an art
form - You promise yourself that, when life slows down, you will
take time to do the things you always wanted to do - You make
promises you don't keep
There is a great line from a song, "I'm in a hurry to get things
done. I rush and rush until life's no fun." Emergency living
causes us to rush right through life. We don't notice what is
happening around us and, when we get to where we are rushing to,
we simply hurry through so we can get to the next emergency.
Slow down! You will get to where you are going soon enough. Like
the person in the car rushing to each red light, they got
nowhere fast.
If you speed through life treating it as an emergency, stop.
Let's face it. The end will get here soon enough. Do you really
want to get there any sooner than you have to? Slow down and
smell the coffee, smell the roses; just smell. Rushing is no
guarantee that you will get to your destination any sooner, but
it is a guarantee that you will miss the most important part,
the journey.