The Gift Of Choice

Whether it is pursuing your life long dream or committing to a partner or even just making a decision about what journey you will take on tomorrow, we are faced with choice. Choice is the gift given to us. It is wrapped with fear, adversity, excitement and layers of emotions and tied with a bow of first step commitment.

From a young age, parents, teachers and authority figures, attempt to mold us into independent minded individuals. While they cater to our emotions and psychological needs by providing us guidance and moral values, they desire to make us independent well-rounded individuals. Well, with that in mind, I think to myself, that is one heavy burden. We find ourselves confronted with opportunities and adversity and seek the opinion of others in order to base our decisions. Furthermore, we hope that the one we seek guidance and support from is equally knowledgeable about the choice we want to make. In the end, we cannot help but realize that although we seek guidance, we are the only true mind we can count on.

I find myself in a place where I need to make a decision about my academic career. While I seek guidance and advice from my superiors, I also see myself leaning towards family and friends for advice. I have broadened the scope of opinions, tips and attitudes towards my plans. I attempt to soak up the good and leave the bad or the harsh criticism aside, which can sometimes me a task of its own. But, at the end of the day, I find myself with my own mind, heart, body and soul conflicted, excited and nervous about the opportunities at hand. I know that it will be my own two hands that will unravel the gift of choice.

As I prepare my mind to see what choice I will make, I tell myself that there is nothing to fear because at the end of the day, the choice I make will be one that I will look at for a while, but will evolve with time, experience, mistakes and success. To those making hard decisions about their future or to those just deciding how they will commit to an opportunity, don’t look at the gift too long, because you will realize that it is wasted time you could be using to shape your choice. So, take those hands of yours, untie the bow of commitment and unwrap that gift like a 5 year old at their birthday party, with excitement, anticipation and with a fearless state of mind.