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It was a popular school at Chennai. The eighth standard students had assembled at the Assembly hall. It was noisy. But, the moment the Teacher entered they became quiet.

He looked at the students and said, “Today we shall see a Management Concept.” All the students’ faces bore quite an expectation. The Teacher then wrote the word, “Time Management” on the board and asked the students, “Today shall we see how to spend time in the proper way?”

He called a student from the front line and asked him to bring a big bowl. As soon as he brought it, the Teacher said to him, “Do you know what you have to do now? Fill this bowl with some articles!” That student went to the nearby playground, picked up big stones, filled the bowl with them and returned to the Assembly hall.

The Teacher asked him, “Has the bowl been filled?”

The student replied, “Yes! The bowl has been filled!”

The Teacher placed the same question before the other students. One of them said that the vessel had not yet been filled and that he should be given an opportunity to fill it up.

The Teacher nodded his assent. This student went to the playground and collected small stones and sand on a plate. He returned and filled up the space in-between the big stones with these. Now, the Teacher asked him, “Has the bowl been filled?”

He said, “Yes! Now the bowl has been filled”.

All the other students agreed with him.

But, the Teacher said, “No! No! The bowl has not been filled.”

The students looked at each other. The Teacher called another student and asked him to get some water and pour it into the bowl. He did as bid. Now, the Teacher asked him, “Has the bowl been filled?” and he replied, “Yes! It has been!”

The Teacher asked the same of the other students and they did not give any reply. For a time they wondered what reply could be given. Some said, “The bowl has been filled,” while some said, “No!” Some did not reply at all. There was some confusion in their reply. Now, the Teacher asked for some salt and dropped it inside the bowl. It melted in the water inside. Looking at the astounded students, the Teacher said, “Now the bowl has been filled.” Then, he asked them, “What do you understand from this?”

One of them got up and explained, “In our day-to-day life we perform several work. Since we are continuously engaged in some work, without any rest, we postpone some other work. We also give up some work due to shortage of time. We say that it is due to shortage of time. But, if we would only stop to think, we would find that with proper planning there would be enough time to do all the work and that shortage of time is but an illusion.”

The Teacher called him up and asked him to remove the contents of the bowl. He poured the water into another bowl. He removed the sand, small stones and big stones and placed them each separately in a group. Now, the Teacher asked him to first pour water into the bowl, then drop the sand, then the small stones followed by big stones, thus reversing the earlier process. That student at first poured the water into the bowl, then dropped the sand, the small stones and then the big stones into the bowl. He now found that there was no place for some of the big stones.

The Teacher who was watching said, “This is the lesson that I wish to teach. Big stones represent the important work and goal in our life. Small stones, sand and water are other work. Just as we filled the bowl with the big stones at first, we should at first allot our time for the important work. If we do so we would have time to do the other works just as we were able to later fill the bowl with sand, small stones and water. On the contrary, if we perform the smaller/not-so-important work at first we would not find time to perform the important work and goal just like filling up the bowl at first with small stones, sand and water left no place for the bigger stones. Therefore, we should plan our work well and give foremost importance to major work.”

Let us also give foremost importance to our goal and important work.

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