Day 5
It’s nearly midnight and I choose to write instead of getting ready for bed. Not necessarily sleep – because I haven’t been doing much of that lately. I have back issues. I have six animals. I have fur floating around my house. And because I have six animals who are not hairless which makes for the fur floating around my house – I need to vacuum. And when I vacuum … well, let’s just say the back issues become very loud in their displeasure and I can’t sleep. I might be in BED – but I’m not sleeping.
But that’s my choice. I choose to have six non-hairless animals and I choose to have a clean house (which means a LOT of vacuum detail) and I choose to endure the discomfort and sleeplessness that that chore brings (because I am not having surgery) and yet … instead of being grateful for the choices I have made (bringing six wonderful (non-hairless) animals who love me and bring comfort and sweetness into my life, living where I do and how I do, and doing my own vacuuming) … I grumble about them.
Choices. So many choices.
In any case – my desire to write this was primarily initiated by one word … (yep – you are so good at this) … CHOOSE. Odd how you hear or see a word and then it’s in your mind for that day or for a week afterwards. I saw the word CHOOSE three times in the last two days – the last while I was sitting down, in front of a nice roaring fire (thank you junk mail – it burns so nicely), reading a magazine. I was flipping through when there it was in 2 inch letters, staring up at me from the page, the word … Choose.
Weird.
I didn’t think anything about it the first time I saw the word. Who would? But the second time I saw the word I thought, “Oh, look out … this is one of those words I’m going to keeping seeing.” And well, I was right. (Again! Imagine that!)
And so I was thinking most of this afternoon about choices … and how lucky I am (even though I grumble about things) and how lucky we are, as a society, to have the choices we do. And then tonight, all cozy in front of the fire, those thoughts swirled, again, around in my head when I saw that word again. CHOOSE. And it made me think how much we (I’m speaking generally and collectively) take those choices for granted.
Most of us.
Ever think about it? Most of us choose our mood. We choose to be happy. Or not. We choose where we live, where we work, how we travel. We choose what we wear, how we worship, how we play, how we wear our hair. We choose our friends, our lovers, our mates, our habits. We choose how to spend our money, what we eat, where to go, what to do, what to say.
Wow … so MANY choices. And so many times those choices are made impulsively, rashly, stupidly. You hear it said often, “Choose wisely.” But do we?
I’m now wondering what was the last choice I made that I was really wholly aware of. We make an infinite number of choices every day – mostly without thinking about them. I am just as guilty as the next person about not being conscious when I choose things in my life. There are so many options (choices) that I think we tend to automate things. We are “there” – but not really.
We (me, too) grumble about a million things – the snow, the heat, the weather, the traffic, the cost of whatever, the rude bank clerk, our finances, our jobs, our families, ours bosses, our weight, our backs (I know I’m not the only one out there on this one), our … WHATEVER.
And it dawned on me that for having so many choices I should be grateful. SO grateful. And I shouldn’t be grumbling. And yet – as noted – I don’t (usually) even give “things” a second thought and grumble along.
Until yesterday.
A friend of mine (thanks Sandra) sent me the most incredible link. A dear friend of hers, Sara, passed away recently and the family is publishing Sara’s blog. I’m including the link here. I really hope you choose to open it up and read some of it. It made me rethink things. I need to be more aware of my choices. I need to choose wisely. I need to be more like Sara. She had such a difficult life … and yet, amazingly – she decided every day to … Choose Joy.
Just think what our lives would be if we all consciously decided to choose that, too.