Inconvenience

A couple of years ago I read a book called “The Obstacle is the Way” by Ryan Holiday. It was about how when going through life, we see obstacles as something to get around or get through in order to reach our goals. They are something to pass, get over with quickly, something in the way of our productivity. The book claims that instead, we should look at the obstacle becoming the path. It is not in the way, it is the way.

Today, I watched a video by one of my favorite YouTubers named Beau Miles. If you don’t know who Beau is, he’s a professional adventurer and film maker, and all around quirky dude. I love his outlook on many things, including the re-use of stuff most other people would throw away.

But the video I watched today was about taking a simple task (meeting someone for a podcast) and turning it into an adventure - basically making it the most inconvenient task possible, all for the sake of the experience.

I’m struck by the fact that we tend to abhor inconvenience in our society. A large percentage of my life revolves around finding easier, faster, less effortful ways of moving through my day to day life, specifically in my work as a SysAdmin.

But I’ve started to think that doing inconvenient things for the sake of the inconvenience is an important part of our life on this planet.

Take, for instance, the simple act of walking. It’s much more convenient to drive somewhere. It takes less physical energy, less time, and allows me to “get more done” in a day. But if I choose to walk to a location (an inconvenient way to get more than a few blocks, especially on a tight schedule) I feel more alive than any time I’m behind the wheel of a vehicle.

Aside from the fact that I’m burning less fuel and creating fewer emissions, walking seems to feel more “real.” And arguably, it’s safer than getting into a vehicle (though that depends on the infrastructure available in your particular location).

Here’s another example: keeping backyard chickens and growing a garden. It’s not convenient (other than being able to walk out into my back yard and cut vegetation for a fresh salad at dinner time). In the moment, after all the work, perhaps it’s more convenient to gather an egg for breakfast or lettuce for dinner. But all the effort, planning, tending, and maintenance of infrastructure to get there is entirely inconvenient.

It takes time to tend a garden, or build a chicken coop. It’s much easier to drive to the store and buy what I need when I need it.

But I feel more human when I weed my garden in the morning right after collecting a few fresh eggs from the chicken coop; when I watch the hens forage through the table scraps and vegetation I threw in their run, that will then be turned into more eggs.

And human relationships might be the most inconvenient thing there is. Sure, the potential for good things is there, but the risk is also present. The risk of being interrupted by your significant other or your children or your friend. The risk of having to compromise. The risk of having to focus outside of you when it’s easier to just do what you want when you want.

There is joy in unproductive things. There is peace in the inconvenience. I find myself even taking the “long way” or the “more difficult path” in many areas of my life these days, all for the sake of the adventure or experience.

Sure, I’ll still be automating as much as I can in my job. After all, the automation of mundane things allows my brain to focus on more creative or interesting or meaningful details. But I’ll be keeping in mind the meditative potential of simply doing something inconvenient for inconvenience’s sake.

I think it is, on some level, the most human thing we can do.