Okay, stop, close your eyes, and think about....no wait! Don't close your eyes, because I want you to read the rest of what I have to say. Just leave your eyes open and think about someone you know who is always late for wherever they are going. Can you think of someone? Yes, I can too. I made a determination a long time ago that I did not want that to be a part of my reputation. I can remember so many times when I was a kid, hearing my grandpa saying, "They wait until it's time to get there before they leave the house." I'm now following in his shoes, because I've said the same thing many times myself.
I can think of people that I've been around for many years who can be counted on to be fifteen minutes late every time. At least they're consistent. It just seems to me that after about five years of being fifteen minutes late, they would figure out that if they would get up fifteen minutes earlier, they could make it on time. That leads me to ask this question: Do they care if they're late? The answer is obviously, "No." That's the part that I have a hard time understanding.
I've been helping teach a class at church on Wednesday nights on "Parenting," and the one subject where we've spent the most amount of time is on "discipline." Naturally, when we think of discipline, we automatically compare it to the word "punishment," but there's much more to discipline than that. Discipline is setting boundaries and living within those boundaries. One thing we've learned is that if we expect our kids to live a disciplined life, we as parents must do the same. Our kids will be much more prone to do what they see us doing than what they hear us saying. The reason I'm saying all of this is because being on time is part of a disciplined lifestyle, and we can tell our kids how they need to be on time until we're blue in the face, but if they see us being consistently late for the things that we're trying to teach them are the important things in life, we can only expect them to follow the same pattern when they grow up and get out on their own.
I can also close my eyes and think about people I know who are consistently either on time or early for every event. And it's always the same people, either way. If you were to attend an event where you were meeting everyone there for the first time, and some of them were on time, and others came in late, what would be your first impression of each of them? I believe, maybe without even realizing why, you would automatically have a more positive first impression of the people who made it on time. There's just something about promptness that gives the indication of someone who "has it together." I know there are times when someone's car won't start, or they have a flat...those unexpected events can be expected. But I don't know anyone who has that type of problem ninety per cent of the time. I think the real difference is that the ones who are always on time put a priority on being prompt. It's a part of their reputation that they care about. It's a part of their lifestyle.
None of us ever know exactly what other people think about us, but I'm making an effort to be known as being dependable. And being dependable means being consistently on time.
Preston
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