December Mussar Dilemma Recap
Last month we presented a ‘Mussar Dilemma’, a day to day situation we all have experienced with a Mussar question attached.
While checking out at the supermarket, the person in front of you continuously delays you by running back into the aisles to pick up just a few forgotten items. Although you have nothing scheduled for afterwards, you are getting annoyed at the ongoing delay.
I offer food for thought from a Mussar perspective:
There are 2 different things to consider at this moment. The first thing is your reaction outwardly to either the cashier or the person shopping. The second thing to consider is your growing internal feeling of impatience and annoyance even though you have no pressing deadline.
Option 1: Complain to the cashier while the shopper has run back into the store.
Although it is understandable why someone might opt for this, it would obviously involve speaking of someone behind their back.
Option 2: Tell the person delaying you that you are in a hurry, even though you are not.
This option might well bring about an apology and a change of behaviour (best case) but it is clearly based on an untruth.
Option 3: Tell the person delaying you that you would appreciate if they would finish all their shopping before going to the cashier.
This person will likely feel awkward and embarrassed. Since Judaism takes this very seriously, you’d need a strong purpose for publicly chastising someone. Since the purpose is to vent your frustration, Mussar would question choosing to make yourself feel better by making someone else feel badly.
Option 4: Subtly change to another cashier.
By choosing a different cashier you are effectively changing your environment. Environments and events speak to us as powerfully as do people and sometimes a subtle change in environment is just the choice that fits the moment.
Mandatory Option 5: Address your frustration
Mussar would now strongly recommend that you explore the frustration and irritation you experienced. With no deadline at stake, why were you so annoyed by the delay?
January 21st, 2010 at 12:31 pm
In the matter of the shopper continuously checking out, I think I would respectfully question the options analysis, and the Mussar mandatory option, certainly as an ethicist but also as a Jew. In Option 3, the person in front need not be upbraided out of frustration but with a sense that there need be fairness for us all. The never-ending supplemental shopper inconveneniences him/her self, you in the line, everyone behinfd you, and the store checkout staffer. Issues, both ethical (fairness, respect for opthers, do unto others as..) and operational (efficiency, effectiveness, consistency) abound. There is a derech eretz involved, otherwise we’d have everyone following this sequential check out.
Two of my corporate retail clients are switching to self checkout experiments, for many reasons, of which this is one.
I enjoyed the options and analysis, but disagree with the recommended best solution. Indeed, in my company’s values and ethics practice, all our trainers would apply a four step decision making model.