Actually, two words: Use. It.

Protect your mind. Don’t allow your head to spend too much time drowning in self-pity, bitterness, anger or other destructive thoughts. You are as you think. Think like a turd for too long, and your thinking starts to stink.

Protect your heart. A proverb says, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.” Give your heart to the wrong things, you might end up where you don’t want to be without even recalling how you got there. Hold on to it too long, it might go bad like milk a week past the expiration date. Harden it, it will become as brittle and fragile as glass.

Protect your loved ones. I remember reading a story in the newspaper some years ago about a fire that destroyed a barn and several outbuildings belonging to a farmer in South Carolina. The morning after the fire, the farmer surveyed the wreckage. He heard a noise coming from under a heap of ashes where his barn once stood. Nudging the pile with his boot, he jumped back as three chicks ran out from the ash heap. Love often involves sacrifice. When the fire started, the mother hen stayed with her chicks, using her body to protect them from the flames.

While you can’t save the world, you can gather up those you love and protect them from harm.

Protect yourself. Unlike cats, you have just one life. Whether you are saving or spending parts of yourself today, take with you the awareness that it’s all you got. When your life is over, there is no refund for unused portions. But neither is there a contest for who can use it all up and burn out the fastest.

Now be honest. Did you think I was going to talk about another kind of protection?