Choices

The number of choices we make in a day is incredible.  Small things like, should I work out and get some exercise or get comfy on the couch with a good movie?  Do I want chicken for dinner, or should I have fish? Clean the garage?  No, I don’t think so.  But there are big choices to be made as well.  Take a new job?   Start a new life someplace new?  Get married?  Have children? Get divorced?  And then, of course, there is the choice to do nothing, but even that has its path that will need to be traveled.  

The flip side to making choices is closing doors to other options.  This became very clear to me in my late 20s when I finally understood that if I wanted to go deeper into what was most important and critical in my life, I needed to let go of some other things of lesser significance.  I could not be a monk and have an intimate, loving relationship with a spouse.  I could not have the mansion on the lake and still embrace a life of simplicity.  I could not find meaning and significance in my life and continue the self-indulgence of being a party boy.  Those were the years of seeking love, belonging, and intimacy in all the wrong places, then oddly going to church the next day to grow closer to God.  It was a painful cycle of never entirely choosing to follow one path or the other, fearing that letting go of either would somehow diminish my identity.

As adults, we may still catch ourselves “wanting it all.”  Of course, it is all part of our sacred journey, and we all, at one time or another, find ourselves sitting on the bench at the fork in the road, afraid to choose what road to follow for fear of missing what might be just around the bend of the road we do not select. Ironically, the Kingdom of God is not a road to travel. It is a way of life, so no matter which route we choose, God is equally present there and will lead us to our deeper and most authentic selves, regardless of the terrain, obstacles, or even regrets.  Our whole identity is not bound by choosing this thing or that.  Our most authentic identity is secured by choosing to accept the love of God, and it is in that love that we all have unlimited fullness and possibility.