Priorities.

Someone's blog post got me thinking: priorities. How do we classify them? What do we consider a priority? These certainly vary from person to person. But is the process of classifying priorities, from urgent, to important, to unimportant, to downright unnecessary, the same for all of us?

I suppose I should tie this in with what my philosophy class was discussing yesterday. When it comes to morals, there are values we consider absolute and others circumstantial. Absolute means that a certain rule is true in every and any situation. An example one could say can be saying "Bless you" to anyone you hear sneeze. Circumstantial is the opposite: each situation is different, and the rule can only be applied sometimes. So, if the "bless you" rule was circumstantial, it would only apply if you knew the person and that you liked them.

Personally, my priorities are measured in a system that I was not even aware of. For short-term goals, this is how I rank them:

1. Urgent (needs to be done ASAP)
2. Important (needs to be done in the next 24-48 hours)
3. Somewhat important (can be put off for a couple of days, but elevates to urgent, especially while procrastinating! This a dangerous level.)
4. Not too important (can be put off for a couple of weeks, months sometimes and can be just as dangerous as 3, because it needs doing eventually)
5. Basically unimportant (had the vague idea to get around doing it, but I never do)

This list is usually absolute. Circumstantial issues can fit into this outline of priorities; the issues tend to differ time to time, especially when papers are due, times of the day, etc.

How do certain tasks fit into the outline? Usually, this depends on one's mood and knowing how acting on these priorities will affect you in a certain way. For instance, I received a box of children's books from Scholastic that I did not order. I left it there for some time, thinking I would eventually get around to calling them. I suppose this fits under category 4. After I got fired, I had much more time on my hands. I got around to opening the letter last week that came with it, and it said I owed them $242.

"Hell fucking no."

This, obviously, became a #1 priority. I called them. It took literally 5 minutes and 44 seconds to have them cancel the account and have them agree to send me a paid postage sticker that will send it back to Jefferson City, MO. This could have been over and done with weeks ago, and I was surprised by the facility of handling the situation.

An issue can be pressing, such as getting the research done for a term paper early on, to allow time to write an ass kicking paper. However, depending on one's mood (It's such a lovely spring day, I think I'll go out and work on my paper later) our priorities get mangled and the what could have been an ass kicking paper becomes what comes out of asses, and receives a deserving D.

Prioritizing, especially for freshman college students, is difficult. We still have this senior year, high school mentality, "Eh, I'll get around to that response paper" at 3 a.m. and receive an awesome check plus, while now we hand in the same quality of paper and get a not-so-awesome C.

How to beat this skill we have developed over the past 13-15 years of our lives? I cannot really say; I am one of the best procrastinators you will ever meet. This is an awful title to have. When someone has an idea, let me know.

Hm. Seems like my time is up in this computer lab. Maybe I should catch up on all the Physics notes I have missed.