What A Waste?

I clipped a Starbucks coupon entitling me to a free drink. It expired yesterday. Here I am at Starbucks today, writing this blog and paying big bucks for my coffee. What a waste. Or is it?

One of the reasons I became a professional organizer is that I hate waste. Whether it’s waste a of time, waste of money, waste of resources, waste of energy, waste of food, waste of stress, or waste of a life—waste really gets under my skin. What I’ve discovered in my war on waste is that waste is a very relative thing.

I work with people who struggle with throwing things out. This is what I commonly hear. “That’s still perfectly good.” “That needs to be recycled.” “I need to get that repaired.” “I could probably use that for something.” There may be no personal value in these items for the individual, but because there is a perceived value, there is a concern about waste.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about reduce, reuse, recycle, but there comes a time when you have to step back and look at the larger waste issues. If you have a limit to how much stuff you can fit into your home, then you also probably have a limit to how much time, energy, and money you can devote to controlling it. It’s all too easy to waste the precious resources of time, energy, and money on less vital waste issues, like recycle and repair.

Getting back to coupons. I once had a client tell me he felt like he was throwing money in the garbage. He was actually contemplating using a coupon for a dinner at a local Chinese Restaurant.  The irony was that he does not like Chinese food. He was actually trying to figure out what he could order on the menu to suit his tastebuds so that he could get his FREE meal. Finally, when he listed a dozen “ifs” he realized it was ridiculous. The coupon wasn't money, it was a piece of paper he could never use.

So I realize that I am kind of doing the same thing with the Starbucks coupon. I’m beating myself up because I kept the coupon in a prominent place for several weeks, thinking I had until the end of February to cash it in. Seemed like all the time in the world on January 1st! I figured I would go to Starbucks daily to focus on these blogs, so I really expected that I would use this coupon soon. Other priorities have risen to the top of my to do list since then, so I have been blogging whenever and wherever I could. I realize now it would have been foolish to shift those priorities just so I can get a free coffee. I had been lamenting a wasted opportunity that I never had. In reference to balancing priorities, it’s not a waste at all.