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Have you ever heard the parable of the jar full of stones?
You fill it with rocks until no more will fit in, and then it’s full. Or is it? Pour in a handful of pebbles and you’ll see they settle to fill the spaces between the rocks. And you can even add sand after the pebbles, and it will find a place to settle.
But it doesn’t work the other way round: if you fill the jar with pebbles first, you’ll never have room for the rocks.
Your life is the jar. The rocks are the most important things in your life, the ones that give your life meaning and joy. You’ll never have more than a handful. The pebbles are other activities that are meaningful to you, which provide your life with colour and interest. The sand is the small stuff. This analogy particularly resonates with me because it’s less simplistic than other messages telling you to focus on priorities: it acknowledges that your life contains the washing up as well as the relationship, and shows you how the two can fit together.
So why did I pick this name? Several reasons:
- I needed to remind myself that the rocks come first. I spend a lot of time handling the sand, when I should be fitting it in around the edges instead.
- I don’t want to restrict the subjects that I cover on here. I want to be able to write about all the things that make up my jar.
- I am a bit of a productivity nut. I’m wondering whether this blog will remain purely personal narrative, or whether it may evolve into a tool for helping other people manage their own jars.
Other names I considered:
- girl about town – the first email address I ever had, at hotmail.com (yes, I was on email in the early days)
- beautiful or useful – from the William Morris quote, “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.”