Awakenings — Kindling, monotype by Michelle Lindblom

Abundance vs Scarcity

Why Do We Need So Many Choices?

Michelle Lindblom
6 min readAug 1, 2023

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Abundance: The Downside

Looking at a restaurant menu, I prefer to see only 5 choices. I mean really good choices, not 50 mediocre choices.

Not to mention walking down the bread aisle at the grocery store where I want to explode because of the overwhelming and excessive selections: white (premium, round, artesano, organic, country, etc.), wheat (honey whole, 100%, old fashioned, simple, etc.) grains in all numbers, gluten free, keto, toasting, muffin, and on and on and on.

Just give me bread that will toast the way I like it and not crumble under the pressure of applying peanut butter.

Overabundance of anything is just insane to me and American grocery stores are just one of many grievous examples of our societal excess.

Lessons in Doing More with Less

When traveling overseas, some restaurants serve meals family style. Usually a multi-course fare in which you have little choice except maybe portions served. The food and service, never disappointing. My kind of mealtime experience.

Growing up, my mother had little sympathy for sensitive taste buds. If we did not like what was on the single item (but well balanced) menu, we were not sent to our…

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