The Tyranny of the Cheese Aisle.
Limiting choices is a path to equanimity and peace.
02.09.2024
When I was twelve, my mother sent me to the grocery store with a single instruction - buy cheese. I went and bought what they had unburdened by the tyranny of choices. If a Russian grocery store in the 1990s had cheese, it was of a single variety. Sometimes, the cheese was white, often yellow, seldom Swiss.
Today, standing at Whole Foods in paralysis, scanning the shelves of cheddar, havarti, and smoked gouda, I miss the simplicity of simply asking for a quarter kilo of cheese. I like choices, don’t get me wrong. But the plethora carries a cost - it adds to stress and usurps mental space.
In America, choices define the concept of personal freedom. They are the fabric of our lives. What career to choose, what college to enter, what political candidate to elect, small house or big house, where to travel? These choices occupy our years in cycles, weighted with pressure from parents, colleagues, and advertisers. It is exhausting but beats living by someone’s dictate.
Yet, the smaller choices that permeate each day have become a distraction. Have you sat down to choose a movie, then after half an hour of watching previews and reading plot descriptions, you gave up? Settled on a show you abandoned weeks ago? A paradox of finding nothing to watch when everything is available. Netflix defeated me habitually.
The failed movie searches compelled an inventory of wasted time. While running, I reviewed my practice of managing my daily choices, only to admit I had none. It surprised me. In business, the barrage of choices demanded tools to handle them. I had several and had the discipline to use them.
I borrowed one for my private life - to minimize the conditions spawning irrelevant choices. I started with grocery stores. They stress me out. I listed twenty grocery items that, in combination, could comprise various meals. Nutrition was a high priority, also. Avocados, eggs, yogurt, pasta, salmon. I would only buy the items from my list and stick to the same brand of each for a year.
I liked the results. My time shopping dwindled to under 10 minutes, including the interminable wait for self-checkout assistance. I no longer spent time planning. I zoomed through the now manageable store, picking items from memory to refill the short inventory.
The effects cascaded to the kitchen. The limitation on ingredients limited my meal options to about a dozen. Entirely enough for me, I am not a foodie. I cycled through the recipes stored in my head. I ate at home more. I went to a restaurant when craving variety.
The success of the year-long grocery experiment reignited a previous practice of living simply. I abandoned the first attempt in my twenties when my income outpaced a modest lifestyle. I fell into the spiraling consumerism seduced by the ease of one-click purchasing and free two-day delivery. It was time to reset.
I have embraced the path to a simpler life for the decade since the grocery experiment. I made progress, slid back, and made progress, but each year, I found ways to live more with less. I am lucky to have a partner who shares and expands this philosophy.
The food and grocery experiment is only one example. It will not work for many in America. Our society is obsessed with food. But all other aspects of our lives and thinking can stand a review.
Simplifying is no longer a struggle. However, building the initial habit was a triumph of discipline. Now, it takes little effort to sustain. The reward of simplifying is equanimity and ease. It is also a responsible choice on the planet where buying one extra thing adds to the environmental debt our children will have to service.