In one of the classic episodes of I Love Lucy, Lucy and Ethel take jobs in a chocolate factory. They are assigned the task of wrapping up little pieces of chocolate as they travel along a conveyor belt. At first, they find the task easy to perform. However, before long, the conveyor belt speeds up and the two ladies find themselves in an impossible situation. They simply can not keep up with the constant flow of chocolate. In a noble (not to mention hilarious) effort to prevent unwrapped chocolate from reaching the next level of production, they start stuffing chocolate into their mouths, into their hats and even down their shirts. However, they were fighting a losing battle and eventually, they lose their war. At the end of the day, they were stuffed with chocolate, fatigued and yes, unemployed.

As we excitedly dash into this New Year, we need to be careful to avoid Lucy and Ethel's predicament. Often, when we first get involved with a new project or organization, the pace starts out at a manageable speed. However, as our skills and confidence increase, life has a way of speeding up the conveyor belt. Soon, there are more demands on our time and resources. In fact, you may be already experiencing this phenomenon in your job, business, civic or other organization. The trick is to find a way to enjoy the bounty of "goodies" flowing your way without becoming overwhelmed in the process.

Your first thought may be to try to slow down the conveyor belt. However, the truth of the matter is that the conveyor belt of life does not slow down for anyone. Opportunities don't wait just because you aren't ready for them. They simply present themselves and if you aren't ready to tackle them, they will seek out someone who is ready.

Therefore, you must learn to be choosy about picking your projects. After all, Lucy and Ethel would have been much better off if they had tried to wrap just one out of every ten chocolates that came whizzing past. Instead, they tried to wrap them all and ended up in total failure. Remember, it's better to successfully complete just one project than it is to leave 100 projects half done. When you take on too many projects, you run the very real risk of pleasing no one (including yourself).

The better solution is to pick and choose those projects with the greatest value to you. For instance, let's suppose you are seated in front a conveyor belt that was carrying coins instead of chocolate. You can keep all of the money you could grab but sadly, the conveyor belt is moving too fast for you to be able to grab all of the coins. In this case, you have two choices: (1) you can just grab coins indiscriminately, trying to obtain as many coins as possible; or (2) you can make an effort to grab only the larger coins. As you can guess, the first strategy will lead to you obtaining the greatest quantity of coins but the second strategy will lead to you obtaining the greatest value of coins.

Which of these two strategies are you using to deal with the opportunities that are flowing into your life now? Are you just taking opportunities as they come along or are you being discriminate and only pursuing those projects with the greatest value to you? And please don't think that when I use the word "value" that I'm only referring to monetary value. There are many forms of value - physical health, harmonious relationships, spiritual development, etc. And your best chance of obtaining these higher values is to develop the discipline to let go of the lesser values.

As Kenny Rogers once said, "Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great."