You Must Decide

This is an illustration from James Merritt. It is a story that comes from Desert Storm. There was a colonel by the name of William Post. He was in charge of receiving all of the incoming supplies for the United States Ground Forces. Among these supplies were the tons of food that would come in every day. One day, Colonel Post received a message from The Pentagon requesting that he account for 40 cases of missing grape jelly. The colonel sent a solider to investigate the missing jelly and the soldier reported back that he couldn’t find it. Colonel Post made his report and assumed that would be the end of it. After all it was just grape jelly. Remember, the government is involved. The Pentagon continued to press the colonel pointing out that they needed to close the books for the month and they couldn’t just let the jelly vanish.  They ordered him to give an all-out-effort to find the jelly. The colonial had enough and he sent back this terse response, “Sirs, you must decide. I can dispatch the entire army to find your missing jelly or I can dispense the entire army to liberate Kuwait, but I can’t do both!” He never got a reply and he didn’t any longer worry about the jelly. This wise colonel realized something that his superiors did not. When your priorities are out of order you will be preoccupied by wrong things, focused on the wrong things and the result is worry that is both unproductive and unnecessary. What are you focused on in your life? Is it something trivial? How much energy and emotion are you spending on what you are focused on? And how much does the worrying on something helps? Remember: we all have limits as to what is our responsibility and ability to makes changes. We can’t step over the boundary line and take on someone else’s job, authority or responsibility! Do you need to change your focus?