Blog 237 Choice (regrets, desires and what-ifs)

“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”  Confucius

Events this weekend have got me thinking about the importance of choice. I've been sorting out my love life (oh yes… the It’s Complicated status on Facebook was invented for me), and then suddenly out of the blue something happened that brought everything into sharp focus. Nothing is that complicated really. Sometimes you need to have your attention drawn to something else entirely to make you realise that sometimes the only thing making stuff complicated are the choices we make.

Yep… I had the lightbulb moment (and so early in 2013 too!). But weirder than that.. Facebook contributed to my enlightenment! Go figure??

So… what happened was that I was happily bantering on Facebook with my mate The Mikster. Then suddenly a pop up appeared… I’d been In-boxed.  For those who have resisted Facebook, In-boxing is Facebook’s equivalent of email, where just about anyone who knows your Facebook-Moniker, can send you a private message.

Anyway, low and behold, I had received a message from Macey who many years ago used to be a very close personal friend of mine. We fell out over a difference of opinion almost four years ago now…I had not expected to ever hear from her again. But there it was… an Inbox from her. Resisting the urge to delete unread – I opened the message. I’m glad I did .It was the most mature, well thought out, categorically honest and heartfelt apology I have ever come across.

It left me with little choice but to accept it (I may be a lot of things but belligerently petty is not one of them).

And dare I say it, a lot of people will exhale with relief (especially The Mikster who along with many mutual friends have walked the tightrope between Camp Jax and Camp Macey and delicately juggled everything so that the riftees need never be in the same room at the same time).

And so a rift is overcome.

Over the almost four years Macey and I haven’t spoken, many in Camp Jax have. Many have said it was always destined that we would fall out. They say that people come into your life for reasons, seasons or for ever and it was destined that Macey and I could not be forever people.

Comforting as that may be when crap happens… that line of thinking is to be blunt… just BOLLIX!

Life is random. Life does not make sense. Life is not pre-destined.

People have free will. People will do great things. People will fuck up.  All we have are our choices. And everything else… is just regrets, desires and what-ifs.

Macey chose to do what she did as much I chose to do what I did. She chose to believe she was right. I chose to be obdurate in the belief that she was wrong.  I chose to walk away from the friendship. She chose to let me.

We chose not to communicate for almost four years. We chose to put our mutual friends through the politics of ensuring we were never in the same room at the same time for all that time .

And then

She chose to apologise. I chose to accept it.  And we have chosen to go on from here.

It could have been a zillion other maps and outcomes if we chose them.

We may have regrets about outcomes achieved.

We may desire outcomes unachieved.

We may dwell on the what-if outcomes till we are blue in the face…

But all those non-choices are in the ether. If you don’t make choices you can’t blame destiny. You have to live with the regrets the unfilled desire and the zillion what-if scenarios.

What we really have are the consequences of the decisions we ACTUALLY made and continue to make.  Because…

Life, quite simply is nothing more than the choices you make.

And Life, quite simply is really that complicated.

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