Do Something About It

Earlier this week our staff went for breakfast. While I was paying, one of the guys pointed out the bag above. They had those individually wrapped toothpicks available for people on the counter. I imagine that they had found lots of those little plastic wrappers all over the place, and someone thought, “Hey! Why don’t we just stick a bag near the toothpicks for people to dump their wrappers in?” I should’ve asked the cashier, but I wonder if they have less toothpick wrappers laying around the floor now.

Now, I’m sure employees and owners complained about the toothpick wrappers on the floor. The thing is… someone did something about it. It got me wondering about the things that I complain about and do nothing about. Sometimes I do nothing out of laziness. Sometimes I do nothing to avoid conflict. Sometimes I do nothing because I put off doing it and get too busy to go back and do something. Sometimes I just hope that someone else takes responsibility for it and takes care of it themselves. Whenever I choose to do nothing, the outcome is almost always the same: Nothing changes… nothing gets done… and I am still complaining about it.

I think Nike is on to something with their tagline: “Just do it.” Stop complaining. Do something about it. It doesn’t have to be perfect or complicated or sophisticated. Just take care of it.