Might as well

“You know what, there’s not really enough for leftovers — I’ll just go ahead eat the rest. In for a penny, right?” (Image credit)

It's demoralizing, sometimes, how easily an event can set you back when you're trying so hard to move forward.

Here I am, working on a number of different projects to earn a living, packing my lunch in the morning to save money — and then I get a call from my mechanic that my car needs $1,400 worth of repairs. The next day, it’s up to $2,700. (I think that's about the Blue Book value of the vehicle.)

I've often been tempted, when facing a situation like this, to shrug and say, "Well, if I'm going to have to spend all that money on a car, I might as well buy my lunch instead of packing it. What difference does $10 make at this point?" But obviously, that kind of fatalism compounds the financial problem. The situation is not hopeless, and I'm not helpless. I have choices. The little things we do can still make an impact over time.

I've taken on some new commitments lately and I've had to postpone some plans. I really wanted to start a group coaching program this quarter, for instance. My usual illogic would be something like, "I have to do all of these things, so I should make time for something I want to do." But time is finite, and the things I have to do preclude some of the things I want to do. I can't spend the same hour twice.

I know I'm not alone in this thinking. We can see it all around us with the way that people are handling their coronavirus risk. "If I'm going on this flight, I might as well go to the mall. If I'm not wearing a mask here, I might as well not wear a mask there."

But this "might as well" thinking actually escalates risk, both for you and the people around you. Keeping our behavior consistent ("If I smoked a cigarette yesterday, I might as well smoke one today") does not necessarily keep our potential consequences consistent.

The alternative, as difficult as it may be sometimes, is to consider each choice separately and thoughtfully. Every time we make the better choice (whether it's less risky, more economical, more healthy, or more ethical), we are creating an incremental improvement that can also, with time and repetition, compound.

When we don't have a lot of control over our circumstances, it's particularly challenging to make good long-term choices. We might engage in "revenge bedtime procrastination," spending hours in leisure instead of sleep because we expect to feel terrible the next day anyway. We consume substances and media that make us feel good temporarily. It's a hard cycle to get out of.

The best solution I know of is to make tiny changes (a kaizen approach). Spend one less minute scrolling aimlessly on the screen. Spend one more minute walking outside. Withhold one gossipy statement we might otherwise have made. Leave one french fry in the basket. Little by little, we can adopt new habits without feeling as though we're sacrificing our only comforts.

Whenever I talk to a roomful of kids about kaizen, I get a lot of skepticism and resistance. How am I going to learn math if I only do one problem this afternoon?

We forget the part where we did zero problems last week because we dreaded having to do thirty. "Might as well skip this homework — I'm bad at math anyway."

It took me a long time to figure out that I wasn't just butting up against practical considerations with the promise of kaizen. I was confronting deeply held beliefs. After all, this more humane, measured approach is based on the idea that we can do the work if we take it in small doses. That means we're accountable for it, and that's an unpleasant prospect if you've been consoling yourself with the futility of the undertaking.

It's easier, in a way, to be helpless. It lets us off the hook. If I don't want to skip 270 lunches to pay for my car repair, I can just pretend that I can't do anything about it and just do what I feel like doing. But I know I can do better than that.

I know that my life isn't just happening to me. There may be a lot that I don't have control over, but I can pay close attention to the part that's mine. I might as well do what I can.