Saturday, March 29, 2008

pushing the right buttons

I tried to open the new Listerine bottle. I tried twisting the cap, pulling it, pushing the sides, throwing my weight into the process…. Nothing worked.

This wasn't my first Listerine bottle. I've used hundreds of them before. But this one was different – they had changed the packaging. It wasn't a twist off like before.

Then I looked at the instructions, which told me to push the two buttons on the side. As soon as I did that, the cap came off without any effort.

This gave me food for thought. Isn't life like that sometimes? We push the wrong buttons; get frustrated, angry… wonder if we bought the wrong item (hooked up with the wrong guy, wrong company, wrong career, wrong shoes, wrong house, wrong car, wrong friends…).

When all we have to do it just push the right buttons… instead of imposing our pre-conceived notions, all we have to do is pay attention to the correct way, the right buttons, and, voila. No frustration, only results, getting what we want or need.

If only life was that easy…