One thing I do all too much is dwell in the past. Maybe in hopes to see something I missed or possibly just a way to look into the future. Either way, one thing I have been looking at as I float through my memories is how my choices have affected those around me. I know that if I had the courage and mental strength that I do now I would have been a dangerous kid. For example, I have always believed in protecting people and doing the right thing. Once, I found my little brother tied to a tree outside our babysitter’s place. Her older boys tied him to that tree. He thought it was fun and I found it wrong. So I untied him and told their mother about it. She scolded me for being a tattle-tale. I had no words to defend myself. I went to her because I had no courage to walk up to the boys and stand up for my brother and what is right. Had I the courage I have now, I would have confronted the boy that was a year older than I and tackled him while wrapping the rope around his neck and saying some words in defense. However, had I been that person I would have been most likely banned from that babysitter and missed out on a good friendship with the boy next door.
I view many of the choices I made as weak and cowardly. I know that if I had made different choices or even had different morals many people’s lives would be in different places now. Some of those choices I made were choices of inaction when the choice of action was the clear and better way to go. I may have had more chances at the relationships I wanted or kept some people from harm that occurred. Am I a pusher or a driver? We all have our roles and I know that the choices I made created more than just my future or my path.
At one point in my life I felt that so much happened around my actions that this world wasn’t real and that things happened around me as if a test or an experiment. I felt that the people around me weren’t real and were empty. I used to listen to the air move as each body walked by and how each form in the surrounding would alter the sound (back when my hearing was still better than average).
Now as I look back I can see the reality of choice. I can see how each person does not walk a single path but a series of paths that intersect with others around them. Paths of people they don’t even need to meet or even see. When you see this much, the world seems like a very different place. People moving about a world aimlessly or with misdirected motives while causing ripples upon ripples that the people around them make in this sea we call mankind. A single word can change a foreseen outcome. Even a breath at a different place or time can cause an intersection of paths. A single moment can cause such a large ripple that it can reach far beyond the imagination. Through it all I found that the choice in the end will be to just enjoy the moment’s breath and watch as your actions assist in forming the lives around you.
Don't let "hindsight is 20/20" get a hold of you... since that's a pile of poop. There's no point in viewing past actions negatively. What's done is done. It might seem as though a choice was "bad", but there's no way to know what state you or anyone else would be in had it gone differently.
ReplyDeleteA big example for me was not getting into MIT. For a long time that bummed me out. I always wondered if there was something I could have done differently. Things have worked out pretty well though. Mainly, I never would have met Mary Jo if I had gotten in. So although it's still one of my bigger "failures", I accept that it was a necessary disappointment to get the real prize.
Tell me about it. I too won the heart of a wonderful wife through my inactions and actions.
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