If you think about it, our courts, jails and even graves are full of people who decided to take shortcuts. They wanted to achieve the right results but went about it the wrong way. Just look at the college admission scam in which wealthy parents, and in some cases celebrities, allegedly paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to a consultant to shortcut the process of getting their children admission into elite colleges. The goal was honorable, the problem is that now their children are being expelled and it looks like some parents may even be going to jail.

The goal of every shortcut is to enable you to reach your destination as fast as possible but with few sacrifices. The tragedy is that eventually, you end up losing far more than the sacrifices and the time it would have taken you if you had not taken the shortcut. Shortcuts may be a great idea geographically speaking, but not so good in the important areas of your life. Most divorces, children out of wedlock, health conditions, financial issues, and most problems are the result of taking shortcuts. It’s not enough to want to achieve the right results, you must also achieve them the right way.

Two areas in which you should never take shortcuts: 

1. Procrastinating

Sluggards do not plow in season; so at harvest time they look but find nothing. – Proverbs 20:4 NIV

Let’s be honest. The stuff that you put aside to do later almost never get done. You must wake up each day with the determination, courage, and discipline not to take the shortcut, but rather to invest the necessary time and sacrifices to achieve your goal. It’s time to get done those things you’ve been meaning to get done. There’s a very famous Spanish hymn I grew up with that say’s, “don’t put off till tomorrow what you can do today. Or as Pablo Picasso said, “only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.”

2. Neglecting the important relationships in your life.

 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. – Romans 12:10 NIV

It’s painful to love someone and not to be loved in return, what hurts, even more, is to love someone and never take the time to express how much you love them. Those you neglect today for the sake of the shortcut may turn out to be the ones you’re going to need tomorrow.