A teacher, in front of his students, without saying a word, took a large glass jar and proceeded to fill it with stones the size of golf balls.
He then asked the students if the boat was full. The students agreed to say yes.
The professor picked up a box full of pellet-sized stones and emptied them into the boat. These filled the empty spaces left between the larger stones.
The teacher asked the students again if the boat was full, and they answered yes.
Then the teacher took a box of sand and emptied it into the boat. Of course the sand filled all the empty spaces and the professor asked again if the boat was full. On this occasion the students responded with a unanimous yes.
The professor quickly added two glasses of water to the contents of the pot and sure enough, the liquid filled all the empty spaces between the sand. The students laughed. When the laughter died down, the teacher told them:
– I want you to notice that this boat represents life. The stones are important things like family, children, health, friends, love, things that you are passionate about. They are things that, even if we lost the rest and only these were left to us, your lives would still be full.
– The smallest stones are the other things that matter to us, like work, the house, the car… The sand is the rest of the little things.
– If we put the sand in the boat first, there would be no room for the stones. So it is with life. If we spent all of our time and energy on the little things, we would never have room for the really important things.
– Pay attention to the things that are crucial to your happiness. Play with your children, give yourself time to go to the doctor, go with your partner to dinner, practice your sport or your favorite hobby. There will always be time to clean the house, to repair the faucet. Take care of the big stones first, the things that really matter to you. Set your priorities, the rest is just sand.
One of the students raised his hand and asked what the water represented. The teacher smiled and said:
I love that you ask me this question! It is to show that even if your life seems full, there is always room to share a drink with a friend.