(This article is from today's issue of my newsletter)

What is the real top priority in your life right now? I don’t mean theoretically – I mean what do your actions show that your top priority really is?

You can tell your top priority because when there is a clash, it’s the one that wins.

For many people the top priority in their life is work. For others it is their children. For some it may be having a good time. The top priority depends a lot on the stage of life you have reached.

It is a very important question this: because it shapes the whole direction of your life.

The danger is that we don’t chose our top priority consciously. We just drift into it through the pressure of circumstances, and then one morning we wake up and realise that our lives are not in our control: our actions are reflecting a top priority which is not what we really want it to be.

I’ve known many men, in particular, complain that they are missing their children growing up because of the demands of work. In this case their actual top priority (work) is not the same as what they would like it to be (family).

Another example is university students who spend their time partying instead of working. They then bitterly regret that they wasted their time at university. In this case their actual top priority (having a good time) was different from the one which would have made all the difference to the rest of their lives (getting a good degree).

You can check out for yourself whether your top priority is right. What do you want your top priority to be? Write it down. Now ask yourself: when it comes to a clash has this in fact won out over everything else? If there’s something else that usually wins over it, then that’s your real top priority.

If you’ve found that your real top priority is not what you want it to be, you need to make a conscious decision to change your priorities. Are you willing to do that?