More Adventures in Philosophy - ;-)

You all know I am an amateur psychologist – I quite enjoy examining my feelings about things and trying to think about why they affect me the way they do.  And I want to include these thoughts on my blog – because they sure are part of the adventure of building our home.

Anyway, way back in December, Richard, our building supervisor wrote on our invoice that he welcomed any feedback – and I think it is important to let people who you are working closely with, know how you are feeling – it’s all part of the open and honest communication that makes the world go round.  I strongly believe in keeping it positive but keeping it real too.

So my feedback to Richard included the most sincere thanks for all his hard work – I wrote “We are loving building our home with you!  It has been, and is, so much easier and more fun than we ever dreamed – and we can’t thank you enough.”  It was and still is true – and I think I will forever be amazed about how much more fun this has been J.

My feedback also included high praise for Ryan and Andy – there really is nothing we can fault on their workmanship, professionalism and attitude – we truly feel we are blessed to have them building our home.

Then my feedback got a bit more philosophical – I noted how the feelings I got from not knowing the origin of materials was higher in my thoughts than I perhaps expected.  I also acknowledged that it was probably just because I didn’t have all the information before hand and so perhaps feel like I am not making informed decisions – and the ‘environmental score’ of all our building materials *is* important to me. 

To me, it is just interesting to ‘analyse’ and accept these feelings.

Then I got even a bit more philosophical and noted that perhaps the only area I feel “conflict” with our building adventure is when we (personally) source materials at a price that Richard’s suppliers cannot match – and therefore, when we supply them, Richard misses out on some of his income (builder’s margin – which he has always been 110% up front and transparent about).  I certainly didn’t expect to feel this conflict, after all it is in our best interests to save money, isn’t it?

Or is it?  To me it comes down to what many of already do consider, is it fair to buy goods or services at a price that you know doesn’t allow the workers producing it a fair income??

To me that is deep – real deep! 

Who would have thought building brings me to this?  LOL.

So, when Richard and I chatted about this part of my feedback in our first meeting this year, we both acknowledged that it will always be a factor in the way our business relationship is structured, and it does come down to understanding that fair payments work best for all people.  We both want to be at peace with our decisions and actions.  And we both want to provide for our families.  (Actually when you put the kids in the picture, it becomes a lot clearer I think as to the ‘correctness’ of fair play – it is all for them ultimately and how you want them to perceive the (working) world).

Ok, deep enough for one day!

We hope you have a wonderful weekend!! J

(ETA – while I was typing this up, our shed was flooding, because I had forgotten to connect up our washing machine outlet hose L L.  I try to stay positive, I really do– sometimes, though, it feels like you have to grab that positive thought with both hands (around the neck!) and hold it down!!!)

(The positive, the shed has gotten an unscheduled clean up – and I was just thinking this morning that it needed it!  Careful what you wish for, eh?)