All of us have the ability to choose - perhaps more than we give ourselves credit for. Our daily lives are filled with choices, but we present them in our minds as things we have no control over.

“I need to stack the dishwasher before I go to work”.

Er… actually, no you don’t. Sure, there are consequences to not doing so (like the smell, and an untidy kitchen, and bugs and yuck), but you don’t have to do it, and it doesn’t have to be done then. You have a choice over when and how things get done - and by whom.

Being able to separate the task from your immediate personal ownership (and a feeling of obligation) is a great way to see where choice exists and to open up a whole new world of possibility.

If we frame it up as “the dishwasher needs stacking”, then we open ourselves up to new options. “How might the dishwasher get stacked?”

Haha. That’s a pretty mundane example, but imagine applying this approach in all aspects of your life. Instead of all the feelings of obligation and all the repetitive tasks, we are opening up to creativity. To innovation. To invention. To curiosity, and “how might we?”.

One option is that I pour all of my time and energy and effort into inventing a dishwasher stacking machine. That could work for sure, but doesn’t support what I want to do with my life.  For now, I can ask my kids for help and pay them pocket money. Job done.

In these choices come the opportunities to do more things. Now, my kids can learn the value of money, and the correlation between work and earning. We can have conversations about saving and spending, and thanks to Sharesies we can redirect their dishwasher stacking slush fund into kid-safe investments that raise their awareness about the environment, ethics, and what a dividend is.  I also get 10-15 minutes back in my day to do something that adds value to clients, my family, or myself.

All of this is because I chose to not blindly stack the dishwasher without questioning how else it could get done.

There is always a choice. There is always another way.

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Photo by Scott Umstattd on Unsplash