It's About Choice

 

“It’s all about choice.”

Chip Gallent

[A reference to the breadth of options now available through the internet.] 

But that’s pretty much life in a nutshell, isn’t it?  Our goal – particularly in America – is to maximize choices … and to maximize negotiability among multiple choices. 

It’s not necessarily that way everywhere, and not necessarily that way everywhere even within the US.  Some folks are more content to have fewer choices with less effort, less hassle, less autonomy, less complexity and fewer tough decisions. 

Unfortunately, fewer choices beget even fewer choices.  And poor choices (as in fewer tough decisions) beget even poorer choices. 

NOTE: This does not count or ignore the fact that substantial numbers of folks suffer a plethora of deficits and paucities of opportunity and/or wellbeing due to poor choices someone else – like parents, significant others or society in general – made, severely impacting their lives.  Thus, it’s important for “right minded” leadership and citizenry to help level the playing field wherever possible in an effort to expand the possibility of positive choices for all. 

Perhaps one can play the odds on Good Choice /\ Bad Choice:  Does one good choice cancel two bad choices?  Or vice versa?  I’m as guilty as anyone, insisting on having a Diet Coke with a hamburger and French Fries!  Does choosing to take a taxi home cancel a wild night of drinking?  How much broccoli does it take to balance out two chocolate covered donuts? 

Unfortunately, poor choices are triple indemnity bad and good choices are only singularity good.  French Fries not only add girth and arterio-venous plaque, they engender the desire – translate artificial “need” – for more French Fries, and … due to delayed ramification …, in essence, “license” us for further indulgence.  Then, it’s “Well, Hell! I’ve already ruined a good thing; let’s have the cheese cake, too!” 

Poor choices generally arise from coasting downstream along the path of least resistance and “natural inclinations”, whereas good choices generally require upstream navigation against the grain of natural inclinations. 

So choosing well … i.e., choosing Good, Better and Best, particularly in the face of gratuitous and enticing options to the contrary … is something we have to do INTENTIONALLY – with preconceived Visioning, Vectoring and self-discipline/self-mastery fully engaged. 

Choices made with defined Mission and Purpose are much better choices than those made by default – i.e., during perceived “unaccountable”, unstructured and unsupervised “free time”.  [Note the fine print in Life’s Little Instruction Manual clearly states there is no such thing as “unaccountable” or “free” time; there is only scheduled and unscheduled time, and what we do with all of it matters.] 

Habit is an inextricable traveling companion of choice.  Good habits are driven by and produce good choices; bad habits are driven by and produce poor choices. 

Poverty leaves us limited choices.  Lack of education seriously limits our job, career and quality of life choices.  Lack of connection to significant others limits our active engagement choices.  Underdeveloped talents/skills /potential leave us lousy life choices, punctuated by disappointment, regret, remorse, frustration, inefficacy, disillusionment, fatalism, “bad luck”, purposelessness and overall lack of fulfillment. 

It’s really about TOP CHOICES. 

The bad news is that achieving TOP CHOICES takes GUTS, GRIT and GUMPTION.  The good news is it CAN be done!  The price you pay is full sticker price … translated “everything you’ve got” … no discounts or shortcuts.  And there are no “consolation prizes”. 

Points to Ponder 

You never compromise UP! 

You never “coast” UP! 

The gravity of life pulls in only one direction. 

When the engine isn’t running and the gears aren’t engaged,

there is only one direction you can go, and that’s DOWN –

either ahead (if you’ve already reached the top) or backwards (if you haven’t). 

Sometimes the fastest way ahead is to limit choices – better yet, to simply eliminate poor choices.  It is the Quartermaster’s view that allowing unlimited choices encourages poor choices: 

As long as we allow ourselves the option of choosing what pleases us,

we will struggle unnecessarily to choose what is “good” for us. 

So here’s the formulation:  Expand Blue Chip choices and eliminate Junk Bond choices.  It’s easier said than done, of course.  But tying our wagon to a Star … a Mission … a Great Purpose, and then – with GUTS, GRIT and GUMPTION – stiffening our backbone, exercising strict self-discipline, engaging with successful others, and using our unscheduled time to plant seeds and lay down tracks to a brighter future can move things from possible to probable to inevitable. 

Make positive choices an obligatory charting tool

for achieving your personal Manifest Destiny.

Quartermaster 

“When you make a [positive] choice,

you mobilize vast human energies and resources

which otherwise go untapped.”

Robert Fritz