How To Make “One Day” Now

I had a few people read my last blog, Why One Day is Now, and ask me how, in practical ways, they can start moving in that direction. I loved the conversations that this post sparked and figured I’d let you all in on the process I use to make “one day now” as often as possible. Sometimes a simple adjustment to our thought process can produce big life changes. These few points help me with that. Maybe they’ll help you too!

Take your time with each of these. Perhaps get out a pen and paper and write things down. Return a few days later and look at what you wrote, adding and removing where necessary. I kept each point pretty simple as to not muddy it up too much with my own thoughts and opinions.

Identify Your Values

Values guide your decisions, are what you believe, and are likely non-negotiable for you. Basically, these are the most important things to you in life. Come up with 3-5 of your own personal values. 

Tip- If this is hard for you, take a look at your bank account and see what you’re spending your money on. Your finances are a great place to gut-check yourself, because we tend to spend our hard-earned resources on what is important to us. Does it match up at all? Perhaps it’s time to make some adjustments in your personal expenditures to better align them with your values. #adulting

Prioritize Your Values (As Best You Can)

Once you’ve identified what your values are, try to put them in order of importance. Deciding what is the most important thing in your life can be challenging, so again, no rush. It might help to jot down a statement or a few words about each of your values that indicates WHY it made the list. Knowing the why gives true meaning to something. 

Check Your Alignment

This might sound like a yoga thing, but that’s not what I’m referring to here. Once your values are prioritized, take a look at what you’re saying yes to on a daily basis. What commitments do you have? What are you spending your money on? Do your commitments and the things you’re spending the majority of your time, energy, and finances on align with what you wrote down as being most important to you?

If so, good for you. That means you likely are already making “one day now”, or at least cruising toward it. If not, what do you need to adjust? What changes can you make to better align with your prioritized values?

Now, of course we all have to do things on a daily basis that we just have to do that don’t necessarily fall into the “things dreams are made of” category. Doing the things we have to do (and not necessarily what we WANT to do) in a graceful way is character-building. However, I’m talking about the things that take up the majority of our time- the big ones; the things we lay awake thinking about at night, the things we’re in financial debt over, the time and energy consumers. Reflecting on, reorganizing, and re-prioritizing them could be a game changer.

These are the tools I use, and, while basic, have really helped me (in conjunction with a lot of prayer and conversations with those closest to me), especially in light of the social pressure to “do” and “have” and “be” something else.

When I return to my values, prioritize them accordingly, and make or break any commitments based on these rather than what culture tells me I “should” do, I can feel confident in my decisions and in the choices my family has made together. And that brings me into the present, making “one day now“.