Chances, Choices and Changes

We vote all the time.  We do it with our money and our time.  The purchases we make, the services we use, and the places we choose to go for dinner are all examples of how we cast our figurative ballots.

So, it stands to reason that most businesses and services want us to engage; their livelihood is dependent on our favourable votes, and our continuing patronage.  And hey - when the food is delicious and the service is stellar, when the cleaners make our home sparkle and the aesthetician works miracles with our skin and toenails, we keep going back.  It's a happy win-win arrangement for everyone, and word of mouth is a powerful advertising tool.

But what happens when things go sideways?  The food quality suddenly goes downhill or the portions shrink, the stylist doesn't listen and cuts our hair too short, the cleaners miss some pretty overt spots, and the pedicure we love so much gives us an infection.  How many chances do we give them for redemption?

And this is where the Biblical principles don't apply, so don't even go there; this isn't a "turn the other cheek" and "forgive 77 times" kind of thing.  When you find a hair (or a rat) in your food, you're not going back to that restaurant, ever.  When your pre-event haircut ends up looking like a mullet, you're not scheduling another appointment at that salon.  And when that face lotion results in a first-degree skin burn, you throw the whole bottle out and swear off the entire brand.  Sometimes, only one chance is given, and there is no room for error.

In other cases, maybe we give a handful of chances.  We excuse our favourite eatery for the crappy service because it was an "off" day and they were unusually busy.  We give our cleaners another chance because they rectify their errors and offer a steep discount on the next service.  We go back for another pedicure, but ask for a different aesthetician, because we love their chairs and their prices.

But at what point do we draw the line?  When have we given too many chances, been *too* accommodating, and when do we need to vote with our money and our feet?  At what point are the other extenuating factors too big and too frequent to overlook?

Change is hard.  It is unpredictable.  Changing cleaning services, doctors, stylists... these all come with some inherent risk, and sometimes we avoid change because we don't want to take those risks.  But sometimes, the status quo is in fact the more risky choice, because if our patronage is an endorsement, then our continuing patronage is also that; we are saying that the things that we don't like - the degraded quality or poor service or inconsistency - are somehow okay or acceptable.  And that is not okay.

Clearly, we are facing some choices right now.  In the past, I've made the mistake of giving too many chances, and every single time, we have paid for those decisions.  I'm often guilty of dragging my heels and being reluctant to make a change, and yet every one of those changes has resulted in a much better outcome.

So I think I need to learn from my mistakes, and make some hard decisions.  From where I'm sitting, there just isn't a lot of room for error left in some cases. and I think it's time I said so.