Morning Sun at the Stupa
You and only you are responsible for your life choices and decisions. Robert T. Kiyosaki
The words came in a bit differently as the pen touched the page this morning: You and only you are given the power of choice in your life. The message seemed a clear reminder of a Truth often forgotten or lost in a world that constantly seeks to distract, grab our attention, and influence each choice we make. We are asked to choose this way. Or that. Each with its own story. Each leading in its own direction.
Choices are the hinges of destiny. Edwin Markham
With each choice I create my present and my future. Remembering that I am at choice moment to moment is, for me, a powerful elixir in those moments when I seem on the precipice of being overtaken by some force, usually an emotion that isn’t on my ‘preferred’ list, brought on in response (or reaction) to some external event. I choose how to BE with what’s risen, consciously or not.
All too often I’ve done so unconsciously out of habit or reaction, choosing to fight, judge as wrong, or deny that which is uncomfortable, shoving it deep inside where it can fester into greater dis-ease or worse.
These days though as there is much in our world with the potential to generate angst, fear, disgust, anger, and, for me especially, sadness, I’m choosing to engage with what rises more consciously and intentionally. To not deny, but to allow the feelings a place and time to move in and through me. To not judge it or me but to be with and discover what gifts of insight are being offered. To not fight, but to surrender to its need to be heard, felt, understood and my need to hear, feel, and, perhaps, understand.
In doing so, the darkness I feel seems to lighten, then lift, leaving behind not a tale of woe or the makings of more trouble ahead, but rather a sense of satisfaction with my choice, perhaps wiser than past choices to fight, deny, or judge. That sense of satisfaction opens me to curiosity and wonder, a desire to explore the world within and the world I walk through, to deepen my understanding of the relationship between the two, and to reimagine how both worlds can be.
Yesterday, unsurprisingly, the phrase ‘sacred reciprocity’ popped off the page I was reading. Reciprocity has been a topic of much recent exploration and reflection in my reimagining. When I saw it paired with ‘sacred’, it touched something deep in me. A sense of ‘this is the way’ leapt into my being. Followed quickly by the recognition that there is no ‘this’, as in one and only one ‘right’ way.
I, and only I, am responsible for the choices in my life. I wonder how it might be if I lived more deeply in gratitude and committed myself to ‘sacred reciprocity’ in the choices I make? And what if ‘we’ did the same? How might that redefine who we are in the world? What world might we co-create?
It is our choices, not our abilities, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. J.K. Rowling (Dumbledore in Harry Potter)
Who are we? Who are we becoming? The choices are ours.
Cottonwood Creek Spring Flow