Work. Life. School. Family. Friends.

I’m definitely a work in progress in this area, but I will share what I have learned that helps me to have joy in this season of life.

A few months ago, I was really struggling to balance all of my commitments; to do them all, and to do them well. I focused so much of my energy on my full-time job, both on and off the clock, that I was too exhausted to do much else. I’m also in graduate school and was taking my hardest class yet, struggling to keep up with both work and school.

In the middle of this, I went to an online group for young adults and the speaker was talking about priorities. He said a few things that I decided to put into practice.

1) You always have time for what you do first. This makes perfect sense, but really think about it, what do you do first? Is it work, school, talking to friends, crafting a perfect Instagram photo and caption? That indicates your top priority.

2) If you try to give everything the same attention, you will always be putting out fires. It may sound like this: “Oh, no, I haven’t spent enough time with my family…Ugh, now I’m spending a lot of time with my family, but haven’t done any schoolwork…Finally caught up on schoolwork, and realizing I forgot about Jesus. Sorry Jesus, I’m coming back to You now.” And on it goes.

So, I made a list—

1. God
2. Schoolwork
3. Ministry
4. Work

—and started refocusing. (I usually had time for family and friends, but I struggled with the four areas listed above.)

If God is #1, that means He gets the best of my energy. The first thing I do when I wake up is spend time with Jesus—reading the Bible, praying, singing along with worship music, etc. He gets the best of my brain, so to speak.

If schoolwork is #2, that means it gets the next part of my energy. I used to “do my homework” after work and spending time with my family. By then it was more like reading myself to sleep. The past few weeks, I’ve started to do homework in the morning, before I get ready for work. Then, I am better focused and can study more efficiently.

Ministry is #3, that’s mainly my role with Young Adults at Times Square Church.

Then comes work as #4. Work is something that must get done, whether I am tired or not, and it’s never fully finished. Having work fourth on this list means that I can take care of those other priorities well and finish my work.

Those tips really helped me balance my commitments better. I hope it helps you, too.

Life Lesson: To better balance competing commitments, keep your priorities in order.

Shameless Plug: Times Square Church has a great young adults group (@tscya). If you are 18-29 years young, I highly recommend their group. You can sign up here. If you are 30-40, join this connect group run by some fun and amazing solid people. These are virtual groups, so you join from anywhere. Come, and don’t forget to say hello!