Lessons I learned about choices
You can listen to me reading this blog post below!
Years ago, I asked my sister how she made decisions in life. I am one of those extremely fortunate people who has two incredible sisters, who are my favourite people on earth and two of the wisest people I know. From deep existential musings to book recommendations, to laughing at the same joke over and over again for infinity - they are always there for the good conversations. So I was curious to hear about her thought process around decisions - big and small.
Her answer - she made lists of pros and cons, weighed up all options, and then she closed her eyes and made a decision - mostly based on instinct. It was interesting to hear what she said - and this blog post is mostly going to be about how I should probably have listened to her a lot sooner. I could probably write a whole blog series about the lessons I learned from not taking good advice when it was first given to me - but I imagine that is true for many of us.
Making choices feels like something I spend almost all of my time doing.
Choices about what to wear, what to eat, whether to say yes or no, which blog post should I write about this morning and so on. And for a long time, there was a big choice I wanted to make about my career - a choice that felt like something that would then spiral off into a series of other choices big and small.
It is no exaggeration to say that for many years - it was constantly on my mind, running like a background soundtrack to my life, present in everything I did. So it might surprise you to know that despite thinking about it, talking about it, taking courses to try to solve it, sending job applications, looking into partnership or business ownership and more; the one thing I never actually did was choose something.
If you had asked me at the time, I would have told you that it was because I didn’t know what to choose. And that was true. I felt as if I considered many options, but what I was waiting for was a knowing - a gut feeling about what would be the right choice, and that making that right choice would put me on a career path that I could stay on until I retired, and that it would tick all of my life boxes, and everything would be aligned! I also wasn’t convinced I liked any of the choices that were available to me. And so I waited. And I waited for years. I sought external support, used internal resources, and waited.
And if I am completely honest, I was full of fear. Fear of making the wrong choice, after believing that I had made the wrong choice before; fear of debt that I couldn’t repay, fear of the thing I chose being just as stressful as the thing I was already doing. And in hindsight, I can see now that not choosing allowed me to remain in a place where I didn’t have to face any of those consequences, and I could instead spend my time imagining a perfect outcome, while not going through the messiness required to achieve it.
Change finally came a few years ago, as I was working through the pandemic, and a career that had always been stressful now felt hundreds more times stressful. And one day, I woke up and I realised something that I never truly understood until that moment.
That by not making a choice, I was making a choice. It was a choice to stay where I was. It was a choice to stay in confusion. I had spent so long worried about making the right choice, and frustrated about what I felt I had to choose from - that I chose not to do anything. I realised that if I wanted something different - I first needed to choose something different. I needed to actively participate in the choice, and that would involve risk.
The risk that things would not be tied up in a neat bow.
The risk that things didn’t work out the way I thought they would.
The risk that it would take longer than I thought (always a risk with someone as impatient as me).
Choice always carries a risk because there will always be something we can’t account for, or can’t control.
And yet - actively making a choice - even when we feel as though we don’t like the options we have - can be the very catalyst we need - even if the choice we make is to acknowledge that we are choosing to do nothing.
Once I realised this, I began to come to other realisations. I realised that there are always more options than I think they are - and when I start to explore those options - even if I dismiss them, they usually give me a lot more clarity around what to do next. I realised that sometimes when I feel like it is hard to make a choice, it is because I am trying to make a number of intertwined decisions at once, and that thinking of them separately can be helpful.
I realised that sometimes the fear I am feeling around making a choice has nothing to do with the actual choice at all - and if I can support myself around what is making me fearful then it may be easier to make the choice. I also realised that it is hard to make big choices when I feel fearful around having basic needs met; when I feel unsafe or unsupported or under-resourced. And I realised that more often than not, I can change my mind - in the sense that while it may be difficult to undo a decision, it is often possible to make a different decision the next time.
I eventually made a number of choices. They took me to another country and another role. And believe me when I tell you - things did not go according to plan when I got here, and there have definitely been things outside of my control. And even though I don’t know what the future will bring, I am still happy that I made this choice. It allowed me to move, to look at the decisions I was making from another angle, to learn more about myself and what I was capable of, and so much more.
Choices… how do you feel about them? How do you make them? What do you believe about them? And where in your life are you putting off making a choice? Remember - there are always more options than you think.
I send you big love.