Less is More?
Posted on October 6, 2011 | posted by:
Have you ever bought egg? Of course you have. So you know that in this process, there are at least six factors you have to decide about: brand, size of the egg, size of the package, if you want organic eggs, if you want raw or boiled ones, and if you need complete egg or only white! Isn’t it great to have so many options?
When I was a child, my country was in war and before that it has been experiencing a political revolution. These two events left the country with certain economical problems. Most commodities were allotted and needless to say, there were no luxury goods available to most people. More or less, we had the same food, the same clothes, and even the same tiles on the floor of our houses!
During the past twenty years, things have changed drastically; now, like most other parts of the world, you see designer’s stores everywhere; you enjoy different foods offered at international restaurants; educational services have improved a lot; communication infrastructures have helped us connect to global community and go to other countries to study, work, and have new experiences. Obviously our life is becoming more and more diversified as time passes. Good for us!
Now, for a moment, let’s leave my country and go back to the eggs we bought at the beginning of this article: How much time does it take for us to eat them? Most probably we don’t waste our time sitting at the table, eating our breakfast with the family. Time is gold, and we’d better grab our sandwich, and have it while we are reading the newspaper at the subway. We hardly even notice the taste of what we spent so much time to choose.
It should be a pleasure to have more diverse options and be given the chance to choose the one which fits us best. But this diversification trend seems to become crazy in certain ways:
First, we have to take a lot of time going through the options we have. Sometimes it is really exhausting that we have to make decisions all the time, about every single thing, from buying eggs to choosing a job.
Second, we tend to forget that choosing the best is not the end of story. You have to deploy that “best” in a sensible manner too. For otherwise, it would be of no value. We don’t get deep into the options we have to fully appreciate the potentials and enjoy them. Remember what happened to the egg we picked up among tens of other products.
Finally, this wide variety of options makes us easily discard what we have, for some better option available in the market. We use our mind less and less to modify and upgrade what we have. We are always watching to hunt the “new arrivals” instead of making new things by ourselves.
I believe this diversified world doesn’t necessarily leave us with more happiness, more satisfaction, and better performance. We are taking more time on choosing, rather than making and using.