Embrace Lazy
We’ve been having fun with Ivy, but I think it’s time to get serious. Why does lazy have such a bad reputation when necessity is treated like a beauty queen? What’s so special about necessity that it managed to snag the title “mother of invention?” With the exception of the work MacGyver does, most of man’s greatest inventions were the result of laziness, not necessity.
The car – Horses provided perfectly good transportation. Cars are easy, but not necessary. Mechanized stallions only became popular because you never have to chase them around a field. You don’t have to saddle them before a trip. Then unsaddle them when you get where you’re going. With a car, you just get in and drive. How lazy is that? Of course, with a motorized vehicle you can get a lot farther away from your in-laws, which some folks might consider a necessity. But it’s a wash because they can come farther to find you. Bottom line, the car is lazy.
Disposable butane lighters – No way these are necessary. Sure, in old, old, even older than me times, people had to capture fire after lightening and then save it until needed. But then we invented flint and steel, then matches, then Zippo styled lighters. All of these were acceptable ways of creating fire, and each step increased the degrees of lazy. The only problem with Zippo lighters is they required us to put flints and fluid in them. Woe is us. With disposable butanes, we use them up, then buy a new one. Now that’s lazy.
Remote control – Admittedly no one enjoys getting up and changing channels. I can remember watching a two-hour twiddle winks championship instead of walking to the TV. Not so long ago, if people were serious about not getting up to change channels, they’d have children. Sure the tikes could also fetch you a drink, but remote controls are definitely lazier.
Since lazy is obviously the mother of invention, why does it have such a bum rap? I believe it’s because most folks haven’t fully embraced the lazy way of life.
When I was 15, I worked one summer in my family’s sawmill. I spent every day carrying a chainsaw or an axe. I quickly realized this was no job for a lazy man. A lazy man would stay in school and get a job where management didn’t supply salt tablets for sweat losses. I think about this whenever I hear a kid talking about being tired of school after 12 years. I wonder how he’s going to feel about 40 years of cutting up chickens. Dropping out of school to go to work is not lazy.
Actually school is almost always the lazy choice. The place where I was employed loved employees who went back to school. The company would pay tuition refund and then give the graduates raises and promotions. Because of school, these individuals would make more money, retire earlier, and even live better after retirement. Not taking advantage of opportunities to make your life easier isn’t lazy.
Some people believe not working makes a person lazy. I can’t imagine spending my day dumpster diving, walking from soup kitchen to soup kitchen, and then sleeping under an overpass. That’s not lazy.
Then there’s the folks who go to work but don’t work. They’ll never get those promotions. They’ll never get a job that pays more. With less money they’ll have to work longer, and when they do retire, they may have to eat cat food. That’s not lazy.
Have I convinced you yet that lazy pays? Then next time you’re at work, work lazy. Whenever you approach a job, ask yourself, what would a lazy man do?
Rework is almost never lazy. Do the job right the first time.
Stacking messages and reading them 4 or 5 times before calling people back is not lazy. Handle them.
There’s no way having 175 messages lying dormant in your e-mail inbox could be considered lazy. Even if you plan to do something with them some day, you have to search to find them again. Do something with e-mail the first time you open it.
Putting off a job you hate but dreading it 3 hours a day isn’t lazy. Dread burns a lot of energy. Just do it
Embrace lazy. It’s just smart. These are a few examples of working lazy. I’m sure you have some of your own. Leave them for us. Thanks for playing. Haird
