I read a quote the other day as I
began to think about writing this blog piece that when we make a wrong choice
the first time it is a mistake but when we make the same mistake again it is a
choice. It perplexed me for a bit.
Everything time we have options it is a choice and just because we have a bad
outcome in the beginning does not necessarily mean it is a “bad choice”. There are so many variables in life that once
cannot begin to believe that if we fall down it is simply because we make the
ex same mistake. That statement would
not even be logical because no situation is the same and no two people are the
same. I guess I would amend the quote this way.
When at first you do not succeed, access what you did wrong and try to
do it a better way next time keeping in mind of course the at not all thing are
in the realm of your control. I know it is not nearly as poetic but it is much
more accurate.
Love is a glorious, wonderful emotion. We all seek it out in the people around
us. I think it is important to our
emotion development. As in all facets of
life though, the opposite side of love is loss. One of the hardest realizations
in life is to admit that any relationship is not what we think it is. It is especially hard when it comes to a love
liaison. We all want to believe we have
it figured out. Maybe those that have
made it for a long period of time have.
In truth though, love is a risk. Those who have great role models
probably have a better chance than those of us who do not. Nonetheless, it is still a risk. There is no
guarantee. The divorce rate in America for first marriage, second, and third
marriage
are incredibly staggering. 50% percent
of first marriages, 67% of second and 74% of third marriages end in divorce,
according to Jennifer Baker of the Forest Institute of Professional Psychology
in Springfield, Missouri. With odds like these, you have to admit it is makes
no sense. You just have to jump into the deep end of the ocean
and learn to swim.
So what leads us to make the choices we do?
Psychologists say that our parents are our role models. Our parents show us what marriage or
commitment should be to one another but they also demonstrate those characteristics
that we will eventually look for in a mate. For some like myself, we make choices based on
the opposite things our parents did because their failures were blazingly
obvious and we do not wish to repeat them.
For others whose parents have been committed for a lifetime and
celebrated their umpteenth anniversary, they will choose to emulate what they
have seen from their parents. Truth is
truth though; neither of these nor all the self-help books and psychologists
assures us of a positive outcome.
When it breaks, it
can be fixed but often, people are not willing to admit their own failings in
order to fix it. Thus, the end is at
hand.
There are situations outside the realm
of your control but in the end, all of your actions and reactions are your own
fault. If you allow the pain to make you
a bitter person, that is your fault not the person that hurt you. It is your failure to accept and ending that
causes the pain. I am not saying you should not feel pain but eventually you
have to be willing to move past it to go on. If the person that you chose turns
out to be a wrong for you, it is your fault not theirs. YOU have to be willing
to adapt your thought process and learn what made them a wrong choice. If you
are being controlled that is your issue too you are allowing your passiveness to
create the situation. (Now most of you are working on a huge
frustration with my words right about now. I can hear the mutterings of it is
all my fault going up all around the cyber world, probably a few not so nice
words too. You should know by now though I am not done heck you are only 700
words into the article. So take a deep breath and read a bit further.)
Life as it happens is about choice,
your own free will. While the situations are often outside your control, how
they affect you and how you deal with them is in your control. I used to cringe when my ex husband would say
it is all your fault. He meant it so negatively. However, when I was forced to
make decisions and I had no input, it was my responsibility to make them and in
turn to accept the outcome. Some of them were bad and some turned out far
better than I thought they might. Good or bad, they were my choices. I often laugh with my friend Barb about this
phrase now. Our teenagers have often found blame with us about the outcomes or
something they are frustrated with us about the things we do. They are our
choices and while our choices influence them.
In the end, they are only responsible for how they allow it to sway
their emotions. If you are unwilling to
make the decision, unable to decide, or not a part of the initial issue then in
truth, you are at fault when the outcome affects you because you made no effort
to encourage a positive result or work the negative conclusion.
Life can be positive, even the worst
of situations can bring us positive growth.
We have to be willing to work through our problems, talk about them, and
ultimately resolve them. White elephants
in the room often grow into bigger elephants when they are left
unresolved. I cannot think of one person
that I would deem emotionally stable that desires drama and conflict. I think in the end, we all want to get along
for the most part. Occasionally, though disagreement
is a healthy form of communication. It
helps us to resolve emotions, thoughts, and ideas that arise from any number of
situations in our lives. It only becomes
harmful when we allow it to become unconstructive and demoralizing.
Bad things happen all the time. Sometimes in our lives, we are forced to
choose the lesser of two evils. While
every outcome seems to bring a different sort of misery, we have to choose. I
am different from most people in some respects simply because I accept that
cruelty is inevitable, I try not to spend a lot of time questioning the why but
a little more time accepting that it has occurred and trying to glean some
lesson from its incidence. As I am not excepting a bowl of cherries in the
first place, I am not that frustrated when it turns out to be the pits instead.
I talk out my frustrations and I move on.
I try to leave the past behind me where it belongs and just carry forth
the lessons I have learned but as my friends Stephen and D point out to me,
sometimes the morals I brought forward are sometimes more baggage than I need
to carry. We should always be willing to
see the world through someone else’s eyes.
Often their point of view can be clearer than our own.
In the movie, Letters to Juliet,
the character Claire says to her grandson, Charlie, “Life is the messy bits.” That statement says it all. When I die, some will say she loved, some
will say she lost, some will say she was a success and other will remember my
failures but all of them will say she lived. My choices are my life. Good and
bad, I am to blame for them but I lived them. Sometimes I dragged my kids
kicking and screaming toward the dream of tomorrow but we have all learned to
smile at life and enjoy the small details because some days that is all you get
the small moments. So celebrate that
life is all your fault. It only means you are strong enough to have lived.
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