Here’s advice given to me as a young woman:
Never have sex with someone you wouldn’t go on a cross country road trip with.
This made astounding sense to me at the time – often flummoxed as I was about the (predictable) consequences of becoming intimate too early in a relationship. Once I gave this consideration – can I put myself in a car with this person for 14 days? – I’d override my hormones and come to my senses fairly quickly.
Later, much later, having raised children and navigated the deeper waters of Life, I still ponder this question in my associations – relationships with clients, with projects, with where I spend my time. I’ve reduced the question to read does it look like fun? for the sake of brevity – but really, I stop and consider: Will I be interested, educated, entertained, fascinated? Will there be laughing? High drama? Whining?
Enveloped in high stress lifestyles requiring more attention than we have to give, the skill of stopping to consider what we’re getting ourselves into can be – and I’m not exaggerating – a lifesaver. It’s simply not realistic to expect that we will be taking the number of vacations we really need to fully regenerate…so giving full consideration to what (and who!) we DO get involved with is critical.
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If we would only give, just once, the same amount of reflection to what we want to get out of life that we give to the question of what to do with a two weeks’ vacation, we would be startled at our false standards and the aimless procession of our busy days. ~Dorothy Canfield Fisher
Genesis Transformation's Blog 
Dina Wolkoff
June 2, 2011
Thanks, Sheri! Every piece of this rings true with me. Asking if something will be “fun” is a quick gut-check that I have been doing for the past year and a half, and has led me to make some huge changes in my life. There are so many things that I do have a choice about – which has been empowering – even if some will take a long time to put into place. I will keep the road-trip analogy in mind, too!
Sheri Lynn
June 2, 2011
Hi Dina – I think we get out of touch fairly quickly with how many things in our lives we DO have choices about – particularly when it comes to other people’s drama. We often think we HAVE to ‘get in there’ and fix things – or offer our opinion – or take an opportunity to be ‘right’ – and that takes a chunk of the fun out of this process of living. I have also found great levels of empowerment by exercising my choice over what I want to be involved in…as well as a welcome reduction of stress! It’s the difference between being a victim of circumstance or exercising the muscles of self-responsibility. Thanks for sharing!