A-B-C Always Be Closing: How About A-A-B-B Instead

A-A-B-B. My four-letter magic formula. It beats the business mantra of A-B-C Always Be Closing and has gotten me to some smart places in life.

A-A-B-B - Avoid, Accept, Borrow, or Buy. And not just in the material world. A-A-B-B can be slapped onto all areas of life; people, things, events, situations.

You can A-A-B-B when you meet a new person and are deciding whether or not to take them on into your fold, or when you find yourself wondering, Should I say something or should I not?

Say you’re at a restaurant and you've just finished a great meal, but are still feeling a tad hungry. When you pick up the dessert menu, before ordering the New York Turtle Cheesecake for yourself, apply the rule of A-A-B-B instead.

 

A- Avoid? Nice idea if you want to finally toss out the holey sweatpants.

A- Accept? Yeah, sure, the cheesecake is acceptable if there are pants in your closet that will still accept the size of your butt.

B- Borrow? WHY YES. Have your dining partner order it and you borrow a few forkfuls off their plate.

B- Buy? If you've got the change in your pockets, go on ahead. What is life if you don't treat yourself to your own slice.

In the case of a less than friendly neighbor across the street (more common than you know)—what to do about the way she blows all your leaves that come from a shared tree back to your driveway and out of hers?

You can A- Avoid her and just watch from the upstairs window, shaking your head and tsking away.

You can A- Accept her behavior. Who cares, right? Blow away, sister.

You can B- Borrow a leaf blower and blow the leaves right back again as soon as she’s through. Passive aggressive feels good for a reason.

You can B- Buy. Buy your own leaf blower and stand guard with it across your lap up in a deer tree stand you’ve built just for leaf blowing season.

I have yet to find any system that works better than A-A--B-B'ing my way through life.

Let’s try it: Morning yoga class starts in 20 minutes. You can A-Avoid that downward dog today and stay in child’s pose in front of your laptop all morning, or A-Accept that you have reached that stage in life where if you don’t do something with your body every day you’ll be pulling your ass up with clothespins. And maybe you’ll move on to B-Borrow that yoga mat and show up at the studio.

I’m pulling that final letter B-Buy today with my yoga class. I will B-Buy Beach Side Yoga with Rodney Yee Volume 1, stay home, and watch my new DVD.  A-A-B-B and pass the buttered popcorn while I watch this DVD, will ya. I can feel my mind grow supple with bend and shape as I ponder, How in Sam Hill does Rodney spatula himself into a Speedo that small?

 

Let's test your A-A-B-B skills, How would you handle the urge to yoga work out, supposing you wake up feeling that way tomorrow morning (it could happen):

 

A- Avoid the possibility of ligament injury by watching others on YouTube bend like the willow instead.

A- Accept that some look finer than you ever will so that's okay, we'll work out tomorrow.

B- Borrow and watch another DVD from the library to make sure you fully mentally integrate the greatness that a good yoga body is, or

B- Buy your own DVD to make sure that if you ever get the urge to touch your toes and reach for the sun, you won't be able to use the internet being down as an excuse to not move. 

 

The answer:
Surprise!

A-B-C - Always Be Chewing. Let me think about what I'm going to do right after I finish this chocolate with sea salt caramel bar.

 

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