worth a shot

From The Geography of Bliss, by Eric Weiner, regarding his trip to Bhutan:

We’re back in the Toyota, climbing and climbing to ever higher elevations. More than ten thousand feet. The road is only wide enough for one car at a time. Passing is negotiated through a series of elaborate, poetic hand gestures, and I’m reminded of what one Bhutanese told me back in Thimphu: ‘There is no room in Bhutan for cocky assholes.’

He’s right. Everything in this country requires cooperation. Harvesting the crops. Passing another car on the road. In the west and in the United States especially, we try to eliminate the need for compromise. Cars have ‘personal climate controls’ so that driver and passenger need not negotiate a mutually agreeable temperature. That same pair, let’s say they’re husband and wife, need not agree on the ideal firmness of their mattress, either. Each can set their own ‘personal comfort level.’ We embrace these technologies. Why shouldn’t everyone enjoy their own personal comfort level, be it in a car or in a bed? I wonder, though, what we lose through such conveniences. If we no longer must compromise on the easy stuff, like mattresses, then what about the truly important issues? Compromise is a skill, and like all skills it atrophies from lack of use.

I like this. I tend not to compromise if another option is available - you know, another option like trying to convince people that they should see things my way. Compromise has this connotation of 'last resort' to me, when maybe it could be a first choice.

And the part about skills, or I would even say attitudes, atrophying from lack of use makes sense. I often feel incapable of change in my life. And I wonder if it can actually come about through tiny, intentional habits.

• Compromising with your roommates on what kind of peanut butter to buy in order to be able to make larger compromises in relationships later
• Talking one minute longer or asking one more question of that person you're not really friends with in order to keep yourself from becoming distant from people you care about later
• Taking the initiative to decide what time to meet someone so you can be decisive about larger things in the future

Living your life as a series of small changes now in order to become the person you want to be in the future. Maybe that works.