Doing the Right Thing Right

I am pretty sure that in your lives, there are a bunch of things you have to decide daily. Some of them are so small and insignificant that they fall way below the noise level of everything else and you chose and no one notices. There are probably a bunch of middle of the road decisions and they often take up a lot of your time. These are the things the family and you discuss and most of the time there is a clear consensus on the solution. When Dave was little, we let him make the menu once a week. Clearly he chose fish sticks and I didn't have a clue why. I think they were easy and he got to put them in the oven instead of stirring them on the stove. Today he won't hardly eat fish. Barb has always insisted on vegetables as often as we could as a part of the meal.

It is the one or two things each day that honestly get in the way of life and cause us to have problems. I think there is an 80/20 rule. 20% of the things you do will take up to 80% of your time and those are mostly the things where you need to do the right thing right.

If life were simple, you could build a book of decisions and reference everything you ever did against that list and for the most part things would turn out right. Unless, somewhere you erred and didn't write it down. You might continue to make a bad decision because you always did it that way. I heard a story about a woman that always cut the end of a ham off when she cooked it. Sure enough , her daughters did the same thing. Finally one daughter asked her mother why she did that and got an answer that no one expected. Mom had a small roasting pan and she cut the ham to fit. No real reason other than size.

My wish for the world would be that people would start making simple decisions based on trying to do the most important thing first and doing it as right (or correct) as they can. I am not sure what different religions of the world say but I think the simple 10 commandments (I hate that it sounds so formal) is a nice guide to focus on. Do not lie, steal, cheat, kill, covet or commit adultery. I'm sure that there are a few others but I always did abbreviate.

I don't think Government is a bad idea, just not something people ought to completely rely on. I sure as heck don't think you should base your decisions just on the law. If you use the idea of doing the right things, your decisions will be way above the level sought by the law. I am sure that you can cite hundreds of things that are legal but not moral, ethical or right.

So, what does this little soap box stand mean in the big scheme of life? Not much, but you get what you pay for. This morning Barb said her best saying, "Do the best you can and move on smartly". So get out there and do and be smart.

MUD