Choices

Herself had an uncomfortable conversation with an acquaintance of hers a couple of days ago.  This acquaintance has an adult child with certain issues; while the adult child has suffered various difficulties and problems at times, overall the adult child is a successful human being:  a devoted friend, a caring parent, a successful businessperson.  The acquaintance used a few choice words that did not sit well at all with Herself.  The words rankled and festered until Herself felt obligated to write a response to them.  I present her thoughts for you, with names changed in consideration for those involved: 

I was mulling over what you said yesterday, that Child is ‘well known for poor choices,’ and that Child's poor choices are related to Child's issues, and I had a few thoughts I thought I’d share with you.


Yes, Child has some issues. Yes, Child has made choices, some good and some poor, over Child's life. While having these particular issues certainly predisposes Child to be a greater risk-taker at times, we cannot attribute each and every choice of Child's to the issues. Like the rest of us, Child is also human. All human beings make choices, for good or for poor, throughout their lives. We all do the best we can with what we have at the moment.

Does Child wish that certain aspects of Child's life had turned out differently? Perhaps. I think we all do on occasion. The important thing, though, is not to be boxed in by past decisions, but to be able to learn from them and move forward. Child is working on coming to terms with Child's life as it now exists, as well as trying to make a fresh start in certain ways. The best we can do for Child, I think, is not to hold Child captive to the past but to come to terms with how things are now.

We can wish things had turned out differently, and we can be sad or even disappointed at times, certainly. Nevertheless, we cannot change Child's past any more than we can change our own. What is done is done.

As I am fond of telling my Beloved, if only we could mentally will other people (such as the Offspring!) to do what we think ought to be done, things would be far easier at times. However, we cannot. It can be quite frustrating to watch someone you love do things differently from how you think they ought to be done, or to make mistakes and have to live with the consequences. All we can really do with another adult, though, is to offer opinion when they ask, and otherwise stand back and watch them try to learn to fly. And, of course, to be there to prop them up and encourage them to try again when they fall.

I know this is all quite philosophical and much, much easier said than done. It’s a day-to-day process at times. But as Lao Tzu says, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. We can spend time looking back at the footsteps of where we all have been, or we can keep those steps in mind and look out at the open space ahead of us and imagine the places our footsteps might go.