On Efficiency

Being a waitress in college (and at times, post-college, too), was an incredible opportunity. Among the many skills I acquired was the art of efficiency. I remember my uncle, a former waiter, advising me on "combining steps" -or:  the importance of always going back to the kitchen with at least two tasks to accomplish. Over the years I've reflected on that lesson again and again. It has served me well in both personal and professional realms. Never would I have imagined that striving towards efficiency would one day drive me up the wall.

Without going into detail, suffice it to say that recently I was part of a mind-numbing experience where efficiency was certainly not the objective. It was borderline soul-crushing to first tentatively participate in and then finally acquiesce to utterly maddening inefficient protocol and standard operating procedures. For those who have experienced something similar, I offer this by way of encouragement:

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

-2 Corinthians 4:16-18