What will you exchange?

If you have followed my blog for any length of time you may have heard me mention that I like receiving Daily Discipline email messages from Brian Kight.  Tonight I have been thinking a lot about one of his past messages.  It took me a while to go back and find it. (I thought it was more recent, but it was actually a message he had distributed almost a year ago - which shows how much it resonated with me.)  I will copy the whole message below.

Let's make a deal!

All valuable longer-term objectives require a shorter-term exchange.  I like to think of it as a trade-off, not a sacrifice.  I'm exchanging this now for that later because it's more valuable to me.

Sometimes it's a sacrifice, I guess, but that's just a more severe word.  It sounds ominous and one-sided.  Plus I think exchange is more accurate and less emotionally intimidating than sacrifice.

The exchange can be your money, time, resources, relationships, comfort, fun, security, or anything else, in return for longer-term value that means something important to you.

All you have to do is identify the trade-off.  This now for that later.  Name your exchange.  Be honest with yourself.

Good reframing concept to stick with, don't you think?  Perhaps you're wondering why this has been running through my head so often lately and in part it is because of students who are needing to push hard in these last few weeks of the school year to finish strong.  Or you don't.  It is obviously your choice.  My preference, of course, is that you would buckle down and focus now and exchange the time with friends or scrolling on social media for school work in the short term so that in the long term you can have your summer break completely to yourself and you don't have to do summer school.  But the concept applies in all different life aspects as Kight identifies.  Maybe I am going to push myself out of my comfort zone because the outcome of what I am hoping to achieve will be just beyond where I am readily willing to go - a worthy exchange.

I don't know what you might need to exchange in your life right now.  But perhaps this concept is one that, like me, you can tuck away in the back of your head to rely on when you're trying to figure out if you really should go for that training run or hit snooze again or binge watch another episode.  You have control over the exchanges you make.  So make each one worthwhile.