Assets & Liabilities
In life, you can do anything. You just can’t do everything.
Lately, I have been pursuing a wide range of aspirations at the same time. Some personal. Some professional. Some creative. Some physical. Some relational. None of them are bad. Most of them are good. Several of them matter to me. Still, there is a limit to what any person can carry well, even when the things they are carrying are meaningful.
I believe it is difficult to truly “chase two rabbits at once.” At the same time, everyone has a different capacity for what they are willing and able to manage. Some people can hold multiple major commitments and stay grounded. Others become scattered under far less weight. Neither is a character flaw. It is simply self-awareness.
I was talking with a friend recently and he made a comment that stayed with me. He said that when it comes to focus, laser is greater than lightbulb. A lightbulb fills a room. A laser concentrates energy. Both produce light, but only one is directed.
That line made me realize that much of my effort had been ambitious, but not always intentional. So I decided to slow down and take inventory.
I sat down and made a list of my pursuits and started asking which of them were actually nonnegotiable, and which ones I had simply accumulated over time.
One of the most helpful ways I have seen to sort this out is by building an assets and liabilities column. It is a simple framework, but it forces clarity. You write down where your time, energy, and attention go. Then you begin to categorize each area.
Is this an asset, or is it a liability?
An asset is something useful or valuable. A practice, pursuit, or relationship that consistently produces something positive. That does not mean financial return. It may produce peace. Discipline. Health. Confidence. Stability. A sense of progress.The important word is it does this "consistently".
Does this generally leave me stronger than it found me?
A liability is different. It is something that costs more than it gives. It drains energy, focus, emotional margin, or integrity over time. Sometimes slowly. Sometimes in ways that are easy to justify. Often in ways that do not feel dangerous until they have been repeated long enough to form a pattern.
Does this quietly weaken me?
The most difficult items on the list are rarely the obvious ones. They are the habits and practices that seem to help and hurt at the same time. They reward you now and invoice you later.
For me, one of those areas was alcohol.
If you drink, I have not problem with that, but for me...it was a problem.
For me, it followed the pattern that many unhealthy habits follow. It felt good in the short term and produced costs in the long term. I might enjoy the night, but later it would show up in my health, my energy, my finances, or my relationships. Sometimes the cost came later. Sometimes it came immediately.
Over time, the pattern became difficult to ignore.
Many liabilities operate this way. They rarely present themselves as problems. They present themselves as “manageable.” They remain in your life because each individual instance seems small. The damage appears only when you look backward.
Most positive habits operate in the opposite direction. They are often inconvenient at first and rewarding later. Exercise, discipline, learning, prayer, budgeting, and difficult conversations rarely feel satisfying in the moment. They demand effort before they offer return. Yet over time, they quietly reshape you.
An assets and liabilities list helps make this visible.
It shows you what is actually producing in your life and what is simply occupying space. It exposes where your best energy belongs and where it is being diluted. It forces you to confront whether your schedule reflects your values or merely your impulses.
If you are willing to prune, this process changes things. Not by making life more complicated, but by making it more honest.
This framework applies just as much to relationships.
Some people encourage you, challenge you, and make you a better person. Others consistently bring negativity, instability, or unnecessary conflict. They drain emotional energy and complicate situations that do not need to be complicated.
It can feel uncomfortable to think about relationships this way. It sounds cold on the surface. Yet relationships shape your habits, your mindset, and your standards more than most people are willing to admit.
In some cases, pruning is possible. In others, especially with family, it is not. When distance is not an option, boundaries become essential. You may not control who is in your life, but you often control how much influence they have over it.
Protecting your time and emotional health is not selfish. It is stewardship.
Over time, revisiting my assets and liabilities has helped me stay grounded. It prevents me from confusing activity with progress.It forces me to examine whether I am building the life I claim to want, or simply reacting to what is in front of me.
Most people are not limited by lack of ability. They are limited by lack of clarity. They feel exhausted not because they are lazy, but because their energy is scattered across too many directions that do not truly matter.
If you feel stretched thin, unfocused, or frustrated, the solution may not be more effort. It may be better filters.
Two columns, honest answers, and a willingness to act is all it takes. Sometimes, that is enough to realign an entire life.
Today’s Forced Challenge: I want you to FORCE yourself to attack at least one of these challenges:
1. Write the List: Set aside 30 uninterrupted minutes this week to create two columns, assets and liabilities. Include habits, relationships, commitments, side projects, and recurring distractions. Be honest enough that the list costs you a little comfort.
2. Circle the Drains: Review your liabilities column and circle the three items that quietly consume the most energy. Focus on the subtle ones you tend to justify or minimize.
3. Audit Your Calendar: Examine the last four weeks of your schedule. Identify what produced real progress and what merely occupied time. Pay attention to the gap between intention and reality.
4. Track Your Energy: For one week, record what gives you energy and what drains it. Look for patterns instead of isolated moments.
5. Revisit Monthly: Set a recurring reminder to rebuild your assets and liabilities list once a month. Use it to prevent slow drift and preserve intentionality.
Most lives are not undone by one bad decision. They are slowly diluted by too many small ones that never get questioned. We rarely lose our way all at once. We drift. We add. We tolerate. We postpone clarity in favor of comfort.
Then one day we wonder why we feel tired, distracted, and disconnected from the life we said we wanted. This work is not about control. It is about alignment. It's about making sure your time, energy, and attention are serving what matters most. When you are willing to do that consistently, you do not just become more productive. You become more present. And over time, that presence becomes its own quiet form of peace.
“It is the daily discipline of sharpening your priorities that makes you exceptional.” - Robin Sharma