Remember the Staples “Easy” button? It was a symbol of how simple Staples makes it to get all of your office supplies needs met. It spoke to us because we’re always looking for that thing, that person, that tip that’s going to alleviate a little bit of the hassle of daily life and help us do all the things we need to get done.
Our search for easy lands us in trouble, though, when “easy” turns out to mean slapdash or incomplete. As we are starting to think about the winter holidays, I’ve been thinking about the gifts I’m going to get for my family and friends. It would be easy to get the next thing an online retailer plops in my inbox, one or two clicks and I’d be all done. I could even buy whatever that is in bulk and knock out the whole list. In fact, let’s go see what that would be. Hold please…
Okay, I had a new email from NBA.com. That’s right, I could get something for everyone on my list from the NBA (and it’s 60% off!!)
It would be really easy. But of the dozen or so people on my list, how many of them will feel seen and known and loved if they unwrap a gift from me, and it’s a jersey from an NBA team? (I’ll tell you, probably just my teenage son.) Everybody else will be confused, and maybe even hurt.
Easy is what we do for ourselves. Easy is “let me just mark this off my list.” Easy is “I’ll just use the same slide deck as last time,” and easy is, “Oh, I don’t need to practice this talk; I’ll just wing it.”
We all need some easy in our lives. But let’s make sure we’re choosing the easy in places like getting our office supplies, and not in how we connect to other people.
Want to see how easy we make it to work with an Ignite coach? Read more here!
