Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
How to Tell What's Really Important to You
Use these strategies to identify your priorities and live your passions.
Posted August 1, 2019 Reviewed by Davia Sills
What’s the most important part of your life—your family? Serving others? Your faith?
There’s one simple way to tell: “Show me your schedule, and I’ll show you your priorities,” said Doug Holt, whom I recently spoke with on the Think Act Be podcast. Doug owns multiple businesses and is a holistic executive coach. He aims to help busy people align their lives with what they truly care about.
Look at Your Calendar
“One of the first things I do as a coach is to look at people’s calendars,” Holt told me. “Often, what they tell me their priorities are, versus what I see on their calendars, are completely opposite.”
I can certainly relate—I still remember clearly a spring evening in 2010 when this message hit home (quite literally). I was walking home from the train after work, caught up in my usual strategizing for the evening ahead. For some reason, on this particular night, I actually realized what I was thinking: How can I get through the evening routine with my family as quickly as possible so I can get back to my work?
I was shocked. I had always told myself that my wife and children were the most important part of my life, and yet I was treating them as a box to check so I could get back to my “real work.”
Be Honest (Even When It Hurts)
It was painful to acknowledge with what Holt calls “radical honesty” that my priorities had gotten completely reversed from what I wanted them to be. I liked to think of myself as a family man, who always made time for the people he cared about. But I realized I put work ahead of everything else, and considered family life an imposition on what I was working toward.
“You have to take accountability,” said Holt. “You are where you are because of your choices and the actions you’ve taken.”
As painful as it was to acknowledge the truth, it was the only way to start thinking about changes I wanted to make. I can still see the low sunlight lighting up the brilliant yellow forsythia flowers as I asked myself: What would my family life be like if I gave it the same energy and purpose that I give to my professional life?
Track Your Time
As a cognitive-behavioral therapist, I often have people keep track of how they spend their time over the course of a few days, using a standard form like this one (from Retrain Your Brain: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy in 7 Weeks). As we review their sheets together, patterns emerge.
Are there wasted hours in the day? Does all of their time go toward things that are urgent, and none toward what’s truly important to them? Are their days filled with activities that are neither satisfying nor fun?
Holt described a similar practice with his clients. “I recommend that everyone track their time and see what they’re really spending it on,” he said. “Put a time tracker on your phone and on your computer.” What you find may surprise you.
“It’s shocking for a lot of people,” said Holt, “when they start to notice some trends. Maybe they’re on Facebook for an hour a day or playing a lot of games. The data doesn’t lie, and it’s really eye-opening.”
Align Your Calendar With Your Values
Someone I worked with years ago made a comment that stuck with me—“I need to align my calendar with my values,” he told me. He had noticed that he never seemed to get to the things he really cared about. As I had found in my own life, this person discovered a disconnect between the life he wanted to be living and the way he spent his days.
“Your calendar reflects where you want to go in life,” said Holt. He regularly asks himself a similar question to the one I heard years ago, especially since becoming a dad. “When I look at my calendar, does it reflect my values—my ideal self—and the things I want to portray to my 2-year-old son?”
Consultant and entrepreneur Steve McClatchy offers helpful guidance in moving toward our most important goals and living out our values. He advises that we block out time in our schedules for the things we want to make sure we do, especially when they don’t have deadlines.
For example, we can plan a date with our kids, or an hour to work on a book proposal we’ve been wanting to put together. If we wait until we’ve finished “everything else,” there will always be something more pressing to do. But if we reserve time for our passions and guard that time jealously, we’ll do more of the things that bring meaning to our lives.
“We all have 24 hours in a day, so it comes back to priorities,” said Holt. “If you can’t find time for what you want to do, it’s not a priority for you. I know that’s not what people want to hear, but that’s the truth.”
What’s one thing you’ve been wanting to do more of but have struggled to find the time? Look at your calendar and plan a specific time to do it. Be sure to protect that time like your life depends on it—because, in truth, it does.
The full conversation with Doug Holt is available here: How to Take Responsibility for Living Your Dreams.
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