Scarcity or Bounty

When I was working, I often advised people leaders that their employees would make the best bad choice that was available to them.

I also learned when presenting my leadership with a choice, that if I could only offer them bad choices, I should make certain that the bad choice I wanted them to choose was significantly less bad than the worse choice I didn't want them to choose.

When I learned comparative analysis in grade school, I was taught with the example of good, better and best.  I'm puzzled as to why in 21st century America, the comparison most often observed is bad, worse, and worst.

And that gets me to the scarcity or bounty thing.  The reason I believe that the only choices available are bad choices is because we create scarcity.

And I'm still trying to figure out why.

There is a scarcity in 21st century America of good paying jobs, of affordable housing, of quality schools.  There is a scarcity of healthy food choices in grocery stores in poor neighborhoods, of public transportation in rural areas.  There is even a scarcity of clean drinking water in many rural communities.

Why?  Where has all the bounty gone?

And while it may be impossible to solve the scarcity versus bounty conundrum in society, we can work harder to solve it in our own lives. And in that way of little ripples becoming big waves, maybe we can change society.

Are you limiting people in your world to only bad choices?  Is it often "my way or the highway" the ultimate only bad choices situation for people who share your world?

How can you create more good, better, best moments in your life?  Sometimes it is as easy as just listening to people.

If you've listened to the people in your life, you know what they like and don't like, you know what makes them happy and what makes them sad.

While in most families a rotation of meals gives everyone the chance to have their favorite, it can also mean that someone is stuck with something they don't like.   Why not set it up that you always have leftovers in single servings in the freezer, so on the night that someone's favorite is someone else's dreaded meal, you can just pull out the single serve leftover, and everyone can have a good choice available?

If there is nothing that works for everyone on television, how about a family night with games?  I grew up in the world where my father chose the TV show, and then my husband, then my child, then my husband.  So it is rare that I care what is on TV.  But I know many people go to their separate spaces so they can all watch what they like.  That can be a best bad choice available.  Family time is important, try to preserve family time by creating good choices.

All that it takes to make good choices available to the people we love is paying attention, and then thinking about it.   We can make our homes havens of good, better, best for our loved ones.

Work hard to create bounty in your home.  Make your home full of love and laughter, hugs and kisses.  Provide comfortable places to sit or lay down.  Have comforting foods available.  It is far more important to have a happy home than a showplace.  Forgo perfection in favor of nurturing.

The more accustomed to bounty in our homes we become, the more intolerant of scarcity in society we will become.  And we will leave our homes full of positive energy from the bounty surrounding us there.  And then maybe, just maybe, we can start to change the world.