The Positivity Solution

I know of quite a few coworkers, friends, and family members who usually respond to the “hey, how are you doing?” question in the same, predictable manner:

“Man, I’m SO busy.”

“Ugh, I’m busy as hell.”

“I’ve never been so busy in my life.”

Busy.

It’s almost as if that word carries with it some invisible street cred. I personally know of quite a few people who proudly rock “busy” as a shiny badge of honor.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing impressive about being “busy.”

We all know of at least one “busy” person in our lives who is always running around doing something, but in reality, he/she isn’t accomplishing a damn thing.

That’s because proudly saying that we’re busy all the time doesn’t mean that we’re actually doing anything important.

So, let’s start here with that critical word.

Important.

What is important, anyway?

Let’s be real, there is not one person reading these words who doesn’t have stuff to do–and a lot of it is very important.

It’s important to go to work in order to keep a roof over our heads and food on our plates.

It’s important to finish that proposal before the boss gets back into town next Monday.

It’s important to clean the house before our in-laws arrive this weekend.

I won’t argue that those things are important, but I will argue that there are other things in our lives that are equally as important, if not, much more so.

And sadly, sometimes we use “busy” as an excuse to put off those things.

For example:

Our kids tug on our shirt and excitedly ask us to play catch outside or play dress-up, but we’re too busy cleaning the house, cooking food, or writing blog posts (I’ll give you one guess who that last point was directed toward) to take the time to play with them.

Our significant other wants to have a meaningful conversation with us, but we’re too busy swiping through our iPhones or catching up on our favorite TV show to pay them our full attention.

Our parents haven’t heard from us in weeks, but we’re too busy with our daily lives to pick up the phone and give them a call.

Our friends have been trying to get us to go out for drinks for months, but we keep blowing them off because we’re too busy with all of the work that needs to be done at the office.

I’m going to challenge you in this post to deeply think about the following question:

Why is it more important to clean the house, write a blog post, or stay late at the office than it is to make genuine connections with the people in our lives who matter the most to us?

Tough question, isn’t it?

Or is it?

Either way, it may be time for all of us to re-evaluate what’s really important in our lives. Continue reading…