© Elliot Essman 2005. All rights reserved.

These pages contain the complete 2005 revised text of Building Yourself, public speaking trainer Elliot Essman's guide to living the successful life.

Elliot Essman Public Speaking Training
Building Yourself Table of Contents
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• The heavens themselves, the planets, and this center, Observe degree, priority, and place. William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

Everyone's priorities—from number two on down—are different. But number one has got to be health. Without it, you cannot enjoy anything else. We cover health in detail in Chapter Nine on “Strength.” If financial freedom isn't number two, it's certainly high on the list for most of us. Financial freedom is more that just accumulating funds for status—that's a real waste—but to enjoy life and to be free of worry.

I am a businessman, but I also love learning and books. One day I will go back to school to get a Ph.D. in classics—Latin and Greek—and just for fun! That's what I do with my financial freedom, but if I didn't have that freedom, if I hadn't made it a priority and gone into my own business, I would still be sitting in a cubicle editing legal news.

You may be just as intelligent and creative as I, but with different tastes and different needs. Today, a bachelor's degree from college is pretty basic, but if book‑learning is not something you really enjoy, you should gear yourself to getting out into the real world as soon as possible. Set your priorities and follow the path that's most important to you. You won't find that path unless you get out and look for it.

Even if you're in college getting the education you believe you should get, do you really need to get the highest grades? Perhaps to do so will carve large chunks out of the quality of your life. You could be using the extra time to run a part‑time business, or to do careful research about careers, make contacts, build networks. You could use that time to expand your knowledge base through wide reading, beyond the course offerings. We're not talking about goofing off, but of getting the most out of your limited time and unlimited creativity.

In the world of work (assuming your job isn't ruining your health—and it can) do you really want to advance in your present job, or should your priorities move you to retraining yourself, or getting into your own business? If you cannot set priorities, you can be sure that your day‑to‑day job will set them for you. The job will win.

If you're in a business, it's even more important to set priorities, and to keep on setting them. A businessperson always has a fire to put out, and a thousand details to take care of. Read any business or management book and the author will tell you how bright businesspeople run themselves into the ground and become ineffective. They become bogged down in details that are either unimportant or that someone else whose time is less valuable can do for them. They don't see the forest for the trees.

You don't need to be a workaholic; you might very well decide that you're working too hard, and need to spend more time with your family or doing sports. By learning to set priorities, you liberate your decision‑making process. You learn to use your limited time in the most rewarding way.