Sacrificing Quality for Convenience

It has a tendency to sneak up on you but are you sacrificing quality for convenience? I was roasting some coffee and reflecting on the journey that my coffee drinking has been over the last year. As I mentioned before I began roasting my coffee after being tired of stale coffee.

home roasting coffee after it has cooled

It was soon after that I realized that while I now had fresh coffee the way I was brewing it was doing me no favors. I had been using a 10 cup drip coffee maker with a programmable timer. It was nice to wake up and have cup of hot coffee ready.

That is the way it began. I was really sacrificing quality for convenience. The drip coffee makers really do not have hot coffee. It appears that the newer single serving coffee systems do not as well based on the programs. Until I switched my brewing methods I had forgotten what a hot cup of coffee was.

I went back to a percolator coffee pot. It has been a revelation as to how hot a cup of coffee can be as well as the taste. I have come to look forward to the sound of it doing it’s thing as well as the time it takes. My morning coffee has been enriched by slowing down and using less convenient ways to do it.

What other areas of our lives can we apply this thinking. As important as it is to review our goals and lists as I have talked about it is equally important to ensure we are not sacrificing quality for convenience. I think we sometimes try to accomplish too much and get so much in that we often are rushing around and not focusing on the quality things.

For me it takes some reminders but my primary focus is my relationship with God. The next most important priority is the relationship with my wife. The very next priority is my relationship with my children. Until I have those three at acceptable levels all other things should take a back seat. Simple things like roasting coffee can bring this realization back.

What about you while reading this? Is there something in your life that you realize that you have been sacrificing quality for convenience? It is easy to make those trade offs but there is a price. It is time for the quality to become a factor in our lives again.