How I want to spend my time...

I've been thinking about something I learned in church on Sunday.... we were talking about how we use our time and prioritize our lives. The teacher made the comment that the best use of our time is in building relationships and that we should focus on doing things that build our relationships primarily with God, our families, friends, and with ourselves.

This got me thinking about my parents. Everything they do is focused on building relationships. My mom went on a walk with me every single day after school. She implemented something in our family called "special nights". Each kid got their own night everyday of the week to have special time with our mom. Most of the time we requested that she jumped on the trampoline with us... and she always did! She would even do backflips! :)

We used to tease my dad about his lack of hobbies  but now it makes me want to cry with gratitude because I see that his hobby was us. He spent all his free time taking us boating, attending sporting events, making us potato guns, playing flashlight tag, sneaking around and shooting laser pointers...

I honestly don't know how my parents did it.... 5 kids under the age of 5! Plus two of my cousins lived with us at one point so they had 7 kids in elementary school! I credit the happiness of our family to amazing parents that understood the importance of spending their time on their family.

If there is anything I kind of regret about my past, it's that sometimes I was way too focused on getting good grades over building good relationships. Ha! and it's not like my grades were that good anyways :) I wish I would have pulled even more all-nighters, gotten in more prank wars, and gone on even more adventures! I really think a large part of success in life is knowing how to build good relationships. I really cherish my memories with good friends.

And do you know what is really sad to me

is I can't tell you how many hours I spent studying anatomy terms, chemical structures, and math formulas and how little I can remember off the top of my head! Don't get me wrong, I think education is way important— It's important to keep a good balance of hard work and fun though.

Ok, this post is getting really long and Steve and I are craving a late night betos/ranchitos run. Basically, here are my goals to improve spending my time on building my relationships:

The Lord: Be sure to always communicate, study, and seek personal revelation from the Lord. Live a purer life so that I can be more in tune to spiritual promptings.

My family: Keep dating Steve! Even though we are married, I want to consistently put effort into planning date nights. I want to make dinner more often, watch more Jazz games, and go on more camping trips!

Friends: Plan fun events to get all our friends together. Make more friends by inviting different people over for dinner on a regular basis.

Myself: Keep exercising consistently and trying to eat healthier. On that note... time to go get a midnight burrito with Steve! :)