I am an unconventional ideator and that’s made my life harder than most people in this real world. Here’s a real- life example I’m blogging while standing in TSA line for security check.
Returning a rental car with a full tank of gas is a must for avoiding exorbitant service fees. So I pull up to the nearest gas station near Nashville BNA airport.
I pull up behind another car at the 1st pump and I’m at pump #2. Turned off the engine. Stepped up to swipe my credit card and then I see a handwritten note that the credit swiper is not working. I walk inside to talk with the cashier. This conversation followed:
I asked, “I saw the sign on pump #2 but can I pay on a credit card inside?”
Cashier: “No. There’s a sign on pump 2 that says the swiper is not working.”
Me: “Yes, I read the sign and that’s why I’m here to ask if I can pay by credit card inside.”
Cashier: “No. You can only pay cash here or go use another pump.” (Now my brain parts are triggering a little frustration and creativity to find another way.)
Me: “Can I use my credit card to buy this?” (Pointing to aspirin on the shelf.)
Cashier: “Yes.”
Me: “So why can’t I pay for gas by credit card here?” (Pulling out wallet, showing credit card, pointing to swiper at cash register.)
Cashier: “No, you can only pay cash here.”
#sigh Okay, fine. I open the cash portion of my wallet, pull out a $5 and rigidly hand that to him. “This is for pump #2 but I won’t need that much gas, so I’ll be back. (For the change)”
Cashier takes cash. I go out to pump gas and stop at $4.25 and walk back inside. I ask for my change and said “and I’ll need a receipt, please.”
Cashier gets me change and receipt. I said “thank you”, a sincere nod, and walk away. He said nothing on this interchange.
Some people can only see 2 ways to do things, yes or no, my way or the highway, here’s the prescribed rules and that’s all. Discussion closed.
This is my sharing of a real-life personal isolated incident, with no intention to connect it to other things going on in my life. But, for some high-context people, you/they might read into this, and come to a different conclusion. That’d be a case where intention doesn’t match impact for some.
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2 responses to “Always more than 2 ways to do something”
What are you doing a BNA?
Was there for 1 of my 5 church conferences tour http://djchuang.com/2013/church-conference-season-starting-up-fall-2013/ ; I was in Nashville for turnaround2020.com and being a guest on The Exchange web show with Ed Stetzer http://www.edstetzer.com/