Choices

I went to the grocery store the other night to purchase next week's supply of rice and beans. Rice and beans, simple right? I wish I would have counted the number of choices I had for rice alone. Brown rice, white rice, long grain, short grain, organic, instant, sticky. Rice-a-roni came in at least ten different flavors...Spanish rice to chicken fajita flavored to fried rice. And on and on. Then came the beans: pinto, kidney, lima, black beans, chili beans, and more.

Barry Schwartz wrote a book called The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less. He writes of being in a grocery store where he counted 230 soup choices, 275 cereal choices, 64 options for barbecue sauce, 285 cookie choices, and 175 types of salad dressings. He also writes about how so many choices tend to cause anxiety, stress, buyers' regret, paralysis. His book offers some practical steps to help a person limit their choices, get disciplined to focus, and become more satisfied due to fewer choices.

I've been listening to stories of starvation in Haiti...how 1 cup of rice is selling for a week's salary. Millie, from World Vision, also told me that rice is really a luxury rather than a staple in the African country she recently visited. When I hear that, and then I look around at our abundance, my brain just doesn't even quite know what to do with such unequal distribution in our world.

My daughter, Sara, often sees such a simple solution to this unfair distribution in our world. "Just send crates of fruits and vegetables over, Mom. Maybe send some refrigerators too." I wish it was such an easy fix, Sara. For now, maybe I'll start with praying more for redistribution that leads to justice. And eating rice and beans for a week which will, I pray, impact my mind and heart. And rather than concentrating on the many choices we have in retail, maybe I'll consider more the lifestyle choices I make that have more of an impact on our world than I am often willing to admit.