Your Time: Squandered Or Treasured?

Bonita’s Blog

Your Time…

Squandered

Or Treasured

 by Bonita Bennett

Sitting on a plane next to me was a woman whose face was worn with grief, as if someone close to her had died.  In her own words, she “felt dead inside.”   In her need to talk, she decided to share her pain with a stranger.  She spoke tearfully of how her live-in abusive lover of five years had left her for another woman and she mourned the days and months she wasted in giving him a love he didn’t deserve.  Several weeks later, she slit her wrists and took an overdose of sleeping pills after hearing that he joined a church and married a woman he had never slept with.  Her suicide intent was to make him experience shame and guilt, but as she lay in the hospital with bandaged wrists, she learned he had embarked on his honeymoon with his new bride.

Unfortunately, there are many of us who fail to treasure the time and the hours we’ve been given for the pursuit of a quality existence.  There are too many who waste our hours away in bad relationships, TV gluttony, and other non-gratifying situations that fail to enhance the quality of our existence.  So I ask the question…What are you doing with your time?  Those precious 1,140 minutes allotted to you daily by the Almighty God.  Are they being squandered or treasured?  Be clear that you wasting them if you…

• Work on a job you hate, and are doing nothing to find something better.
• Spend time worrying about things you can’t do anything about.
• Spend time worrying about what others think. You should care deeply only for what you think and how you think, and what God thinks about you.
• Hate or dislike someone. Negative thinking is extremely destructive and an evil consumer of your thought life.
• Have not forgiven someone. An unforgiving heart will block your blessings in ways you can’t imagine.
• Watch television more than ten hours a week. There is so much more out there in the world waiting to be learned, discovered, explored and enjoyed.  A good novel is a great beginning.
• Are not sharing what you know that could benefit others or giving what you have to bless another’s soul.
• Are not actively doing something that gives you distinct pleasure.
• Still feel guilt or shame about anything that happened in the past. What’s done is done.  The sins of a day die at midnight.
• Are judging others by your We should strive hard to come to terms with  the reality of an imperfect world and our own imperfections.  Though it may be a serious struggle, you must learn to accept the frailty of others, as you wish to be accepted.
• Don’t have a deep unbridled appreciation for who you are and what you bring to the table.
• If you still haven’t gotten over a disappointment.  One should never cling to disheartening moments that skirt over the path of our lives.  Disappointments can sometimes be the gateway to a door waiting to be opened.

Remember always, your life is as you make it and how well you spend your time depends on how you feel about the hand you’re dealt.  Here’s hoping you play it well from now on.

Bonita Bennett, founder, publisher  Of Being Single Magazine and a former TV/radio personality, is the author of  the books “How To Catch & Keep The Man Of Your Dreams,”  and The Coming Of Dawn.  She is also a nationally recognized life coach/relationship expert, and noted motivational speaker, whose life-changing counseling techniques, classes and innovative workshops on life-skills, inter-personal relationships, conflict management, and problem solving are well-known in her field.  Bonita Bennett is also the editor-in-chief of Being Single Magazine.   Be sure to get your copy of  her two books…Meanwhile, read the  excerpts from the mystery novel…The Coming Of Dawn and How To Catch & Keep The Man Of Your Dreams