Are Your Priorities BS? Here’s How to Know for Sure…




Top Secrets of Marketing & Sales show

Summary: Are your priorities BS? Well, focusing on that area in particular, looking at what are the things in my life that really are important to me? What are the actions that I want to take and need to take that are important to me? Even if they're not urgent, how can I get those things scheduled so that they have a better likelihood of getting done?<br> <br> <br> <br> David: Hi, and welcome to the podcast. In today's episode, co-host Jay McFarland and I will discuss the topic Are Your Priorities BS? Welcome, Jay.<br> <br> <br> <br> Jay: Hey, David, as always, such a pleasure to be with you. And another great topic. I think that it's so easy to just do the squirrel thing or the squeaky wheel gets the grease and we don't really know what our priorities should be a lot of the time that's half the battle I think.<br> <br> David: Yeah, I think that's true. Knowing what our priorities are and recognizing that a lot of times they're not really what we think they are. And most of the time when I talk about stuff on these podcasts, it's not because I'm particularly smart, is because I feel like I've made every stupid mistake that anyone can make.<br> <br> And so if I can help our listeners and viewers to avoid doing some of those things, then that's a pretty good service. And when I think about priorities and I reflect on the priorities that I've had over the years and over my life, I recognize that we have priorities that we really put out there.<br> <br> We say, okay, this is what's important to me. What's important to me is my family. What's important to me are my friends. What's important to me is, whatever, losing weight, like if we have goals, my my priority is to do this and to do that, and all these different things.<br> <br> And then when we look at our actions and we realize that our actions don't really line up with what we say our priorities are, it raises the questions are our priorities BS?<br> <br> And I think in some cases, even when we don't realize it, they might be.<br> <br> Jay: Yeah. First of all, I'd say there's nothing wrong with learning in the school of hard knocks. I mean, sometimes those are the best lessons we can learn. But I also think it, we can spin our wheels a lot trying to reinvent the wheel, so learning from other people can help expedite that process.<br> <br> Right? Which is why I'm glad you're so willing to share the trials that you've had. I think that that's so critical. But I think you're right. We've talked a lot in the past about self assessment. Can you really look at yourself and know what your weaknesses are and what your strengths are?<br> <br> And oftentimes, I think you're right. We think something is a priority for us, but in the grand scheme of things, and according to our own actions, it's really not. And we're kind of fooling ourselves.<br> <br> David: Yeah, and the way that I've actually sort of worked through some of this is recognizing that there's a really big difference between our stated priorities, the things that we say are priorities to us, and then our actual priorities, meaning the priorities we act on the things that we do, the actual steps that we take or don't take.<br> <br> Because if our priority is to spend time with our family and our actions are that we're working all the time and we're not spending time with our family, then we have two different sets of priorities, our stated priorities that always sound good, and then our actual priorities, which is what we're doing on a daily basis.<br> <br> Jay: Yeah, I see this all the time in like TV reality shows. I don't know why this comes to mind, but you see people saying, my family is the most important thing to me, and they're working 80 hours a week at their career, or their job.<br> <br> And I'm sitting there thinking, Hmm, no, I don't think you really understand what your priorities really are.<br> <br> David: Yeah,