“If the big rocks don’t go in first, they aren’t going to fit in later.”- Stephen Covey, author of “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”
🔶 The “Big Rocks Theory” is a popular story emphasizing the importance of prioritizing what’s in your life. The origin of the concept is unknown, but it was popularized by Stephen Covey in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. The story is provided below if you are not familiar with it.
A professor walked into class and placed a wide-mouth gallon jar on a table. He filled the jar to the top with fist-sized rocks and asked the students if the jar was full. The students all agreed that the jar was completely full. He then took out a bucket of small pebbles and added some into the jar and gave the jar a bit of shake until the pebbles filled the gaps between the big rocks.
When there was no more room for pebbles, he added sand into the jar. When there was no more room left for sand, he poured water in to fill up all the remaining empty space. The jar was only then truly full.
After that, he looked up at the class and asked for the point of this illustration. One eager student raised his hand and said that the point was no matter how full your schedule might seem, if you try really hard, you could always fit some more things into it. However, the professor explained what the little jar illustration really teaches us is actually “If you don't put the big rocks in first, you'll never get them in at all." This holds true with the things you let in your life. The jar represents your life. And the rocks, pebbles, sand, and water are the things that filled up your life.
1. The big rocks represent your main priorities or longer-term goals such as spending time with your family, or maintaining proper health. These are things that give your life meaning and purpose.
2. The small pebbles represent your day-to-day responsibilities and shorter-term goals. Those pebbles could be, for example, your friendship, your hobbies which are important but may not be critical for you to live to the fullest. These things aren’t permanent or necessary to your overall well-being.
3. The sand and water represent immediate wants and activities or minor tasks that are not really that important. They could be the distractions that prevent you from getting work done such as browsing through your favorite social media site. These things don’t contribute to your life as a whole. They are likely to waste your time.
If you spend all of your time with small and insignificant things, you run out of room for the things that are actually important.
🔶 How to use the “Big Rock” approach to manage your time effectively
1. It’s clear that people with different backgrounds, purposes, and needs may have different opinions on what their big rocks, pebbles are. For that reason, rather than comparing your priorities with others and getting confused, you should focus the majority of effort and energy on your own list of Big rocks.
2. Except for your most critical priorities in life, things at a shorter term and lower level of priorities could change over time. At different stages of life, it’s understandable and acceptable for you to have a different sense of what is most important, what is not. When you are in your early 20s, for instance, your top goal may be to earn a bachelor’s degree at a college or university. As you cruise into your mid-30s, your goal may change into increasing saving to fund your children’s education. In the face of an ever-changing future, it is important to re-evaluate goals over time and redefine your priorities.
3. Although the “Big Rocks First” strategy has contributed a lot of great thinking on how to manage our time well and improve productivity, some people may misunderstand the moral of the story. They assume that if they just rearrange things differently, everything will fit into their timetable.
It’s great to make the most out of your time, but you can not achieve long-term productivity without adding some sufficient space into your jar, some areas between the rocks that allow you to recharge. The habit of stuffing our bucket with too many rocks, pebbles, and sand will only result in energy drain, disconnection from our purpose, and a decline in the quality of our work. The key to true productivity is not to get more things done each day but to get the right things done. Therefore, don’t try to overload your jar with as many “big rocks” as possible, and don’t mistake the pebbles for the really big rocks.
Tonight, allocate time asking yourself this question: “What are the ‘big rocks’ in my life?” and then develop a shortlist of the most important items for you to accomplish tomorrow based on your Big Rocks list. It may take 30 minutes that night and saves hours the next day.
Thank you for reading!