“(go around trying to find the most meikel shitah in everything).”
I need to comment on this, because the sense I get from this comment is that you somehow give off the idea that you believe that to be mekeil is not following the halacha. There is a religious spectrum of halachic observance, but from one end to the other, the observance is kosher and according to Ratzon Hashem. Being mekeil IS following the halacha. If you are mekeil and NOT following the Halacha that Hashem intended, then you are not being mekeil at all, you are being oveir on the halacha. Mekeil does not equal oveir halacha (I cannot say that too often).
So if the halacha demands a minimum action, that action IS the one Hashem commanded us to do, and anything else we choose to do to be more strict, is actually NOT what He required of us. I am not getting into the reasons for being needing to be stricter or not. We all know about gedarim, and protecting the mitzvah, etc. etc. I am specifically trying to emphasize an idea that some people refuse to understand or accept, that being mekeil is not a bad thing. As long as it totally conforms to halacha, a Jew who is mekeil is doing the right thing in Hashem’s eyes. It is only in the eyes of people, that we think being machmir is holier. And I am machmir in many things, for whatever reasons, but I do not think that makes me a better Jew than someone who does not do those same things.
It’s like how I feel about people asking me in the summer if I take early Shabbos or late Shabbos. I always respond, if I took late Shabbos that would make me mechallel Shabbos.