5 years later

So two unrelated things happened today:

One. While packing the food away that I cooked for breakfast, Lea said that she was fine with buying food at the canteen because it was cheap. I said, well the food here is free. Of course there are other factors involved why it's actually better to buy the one at the canteen. One being that the food there would still be warm by lunch time and there would be more choices there.

But given two options which one should we prefer, something that is cheap or something that is free?

Something is cheap probably because the quality of the ingredients is much lower. There's also a possibility that shortcuts were made in order to reach that low price. In other words, compromises were made.

When something is free, by the same logic, it can seem like it must be worse. Why? Because if one is willing to give something for free then maybe the item is not just deficient, there must be something wrong with it.

Well, that's the case if the one giving it to you is giving it to you with malice or bad intentions. But if the person giving it is a good and generous person then the perspective changes.

In life, nothing really is free. Someone had to pay the price for something to be free. 

Free is better when the one giving it was willing to pay the price and was generous enough to give it to you.

The other thing that happened is that Tanner one of the dogs got out of the gate.

And the immediate thought that came to my mind was: that's not my problem.

That's not my dog and he's not my responsibility.

But, whether I like it or not, he becomes my problem if something bad happens to him or no one else would be willing to bring him back to the house.

This idea that people sometimes say that it's not their problem belies the important reality that other peoples problems become our problem because we are all connected.

Especially in a family and even in an organization.

Once a team member has the attitude that this is not my problem, he or she is losing sight of the reality that eventually that problem will affect everyone involved. Yes, the direct consequence may be just on one person or one event or one incident, but the domino effect of that can lead to unforeseen problems.