What are your priorities in life?

There are many changes and challenges in life; what are the most important priorities to you?

What... no poll?!?

In no particular order here's a few of mine, but I'm sure I'll leave something out.

* Finish school (finally) and beginning a rewarding career
* Finish odd remodeling projects around the house
* Provide the best care I possibly can to my animals
* Have fun
* Maintain respect and a sense of accomplishment and worthiness
* Stay healthy (mentally as well as physically)
* Have fun
* Stay out of trouble
* Meet interesting new people
* Keep the dishes washed and remember to put the cap back on the toothpaste
* Have fun
* Avoid letting too many crickets loose in my basement
* Help family & friends as much as I can with their own priorities
* Oh, and have fun.

Now I'm all motivated, and despite how much I would love to go catch the loose crickets, it's time to go out and have fun without getting in trouble.

HEY! There wasn't a poll available when I started my reply.

Oh well, muliple choice is just taking the easy way out, lol.

Paul, I don't zackly know how that happened, lol. I wondered at your first answer.. .

I DEFINITELY should have included 'fun' as one of my listed priorities, good choice!!

My grandmother on my father's side was a very important person to me. My parents used to send me and my sister and brother to her every summer. After a while it was my brother and myself, and then just me. I can remember some interesting tidbits of those sun-filled times...

She had lots of siamese cats. Only two or three were allowed indoors, the rest were outdoor cats. There was Linus and Charlie Brown and Minnie (Mouse) and other cartoon characters. I used to chase the cats and they used to run from me.

Grandmother would have us "feed the worms" ... take out any organic garbage and dump it into an old tub filled three fourths of the way up with black GUNK.

Sometimes she would have us "catch grasshoppers" ... we would put them in old milk cartons and take them down the hill to where a neighbor kept her chickens for her.

Other times we would go "blackberry picking".... those were the best times, we would get all scratched up and tired as heck, picking blackberries from wild patches on the side of the road, sometimes running like heck when the patch we were approaching would start to "rattle". We would bake blackberry pies when we got home and it was the best.

Or there was the creek/river that my uncles would take us to, and we would swim, and try to avoid the sea monsters that they would warn us about.

I can even remember collecting a half milk carton's worth of black river sand and taking it home as one of my favorite prizes. I would sit for hours with magnets sifting the san, pulling out all the little black bits that were magnetic until I had a great cache of lovely black magnetic stuff to play with with my magnets. The Consumnes River I think it was called. Placerville California. Summer memories... the very best ones.

AND what does all of this have to do with priorities? (I'm REALLY verbose today, aren't I?) .... ONe of the lesser impressions I gained from my time with my grandmother was how much I did NOT want to be like her. I wanted a house in the country on top of a hill with cats to be sure... that was paradise, but I wanted nothing so much as to live through my whole life and get to be her ancient age and be HAPPY. Because she just never seemed happy. She would often shock me by saying "Oh HELL" and bemoaning her life, saying how she would pack everything up and live in a tent. Her and my grandfather (whom she'd married and divorced twice) were always on about conspiracy theories. Grandmother did a lot of "things political" in her younger years. I can remember seeing pictures of her shaking hands with governors and I think even one picture of her with some president or other. One of the pictures was of her standing in the Governor's office with Ronald Reagan when he was the governor.

In any case, I remember thinking how "I won't be like grandma, I won't be OLD and BITTER". And that desire on my part left a lasting impression! I did NOT want to live my life in such a way that when I reached old age I was full of bitterness and regret. I once shared this desire with one person who felt it was a wrong goal for one's life, as she felt that desiring to reach an old age and be happy about it was akin to desiring to not live my life.

But to me, the most important thing was to live my life... LIVE it in such a way that I would have no regrets. Embrace every part of it. Enjoy the peaks and accept the valleys. When I make mistakes, learn from them, change, grow. Even learning to accept that not every one of my imperfections will be solved or perfected.

So my top priority in my life is to LIVE it.... trust and be trusted... help many of those who need and desire help. Give of myself as much as possible. And yet take some time for myself. To me, living my life in a way like this can only inevitably result in reaching many of my other goals.

Ah well, thanks for listening to me ramble.... it's nice to remember my summers at grandmothers.

Finishing School
Finding a descent job
Getting Married
Having kids and trying to help them through their life
Trying to become a better person
Having a lot of animals and trying to raise my kids to love them too
Having a happy Christian home

My family, friends, and pets always come first. In the last year my life has gone through a major change, and because of it I have learned that there are certain things I *won't* give up. My family is the most important, of course, but after giving up most of my reptiles for someone and later regret, I have decided that I will *never* do it again- my pets are too much a part of my life, and anyone that doesn't understand that or like it will just have to learn to deal with it. Money would be nice, but isn't as big a priority as happiness. I guess that's obvious in my choice of preofessions- I wouldn't be a vet tech if I was concerned about money. I guess my highest priority is my own happiness, as well as that of the people close to me.

My priorities, hmmmmmmm:

- start doing my artwork again and put some into print
- I'm back into photography but i'd like to again get some pics into print
- have a house of my own, with an inground pool (this is huge, every day i think of what it would be like to have my own house. Its 3rd on the list only because its not something i can have right away)
- becoming healthy. Not so much losing weight, i've slimmed down some but my weight is still the same. I want to lose more fat and put on more muscle.
- travelling to Europe
- finding the man of my dreams
- having a family

I can't have children so that sort of leaves a huge empty spot for other things in my life.

#1=family
2=education
3=my reptile/invertebrate hobby

I figure anything else is just a bonus

Come to think of it, i don't know if i can have kids. I take for granted that i will be able to but until i actually try to get pregnant i won't know for sure. I didn't mention anything about my animals/reptiles. How aweful of me LOL. It is a priority in my life to expand on my family of reptiles. I guess for now i'm happy with those i have. I would like to breed the groups i have now plus get some of the larger reptiles but until i have a house of my own thats just not going to happen. I should really just put the house thing at the top of my list cause everything else would fall into place once that happened. Ok not everything (like the trip to Europe for example) but it would make me the happiest woman on the planet LOL. I would have the space to do more artwork and the peace to actually sit and create without being disturbed 24/7 LOL.

I didn't mention anything about school either........shame on me LOL. I do want to return to school parttime or full time, most likely parttime. I'm not sure what exactly i want to do there though. Ok thats a priority....finding out what i want to do with the rest of my life LOL

My number one is to make sure my kids never go without the things they need. There was a large portion of my childhood that we were poor. I never want my kids to have to go through that.
I would say number two is to pass on my love of herps and all animals in general to my kids. The youngest already has it and the older one is finally coming around. I just want them to be able to not only take over what my wife and I are starting but love doing it.

My number one would be my family, being healthy and happy.
My number two would be that they grow to responsible caring adults.

Ginger