Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Choice wins! (...and loses.)

(Today's entry is more of me thinking out loud than anything.  I apologize that there is no real finality to the process of thought.  My hope is that it will get you thinking as well.)
It seems like it happens almost every day.  

“What do you want for dinner?”

“I don’t care…whatever you want.”

“I don’t care either that is why I asked.”

“I really just don’t care.  Whatever is easiest for you.”

So goes the dance of deciding…

…what shall we eat for dinner?

Choices run through my mind of different things to make.  Things I enjoy that others may not, things they enjoy that I do not, what have I made 3 times in the past 2 weeks, and what was that one meal I made that everyone enjoyed last month?  Not to mention, what is cheap, but healthy?

Choices are all around us. 

Some carry a heavy weight (no, not in a food kind of way), and some are simple (what’s for dinner?). 

 Either way, choice wins. 

Something based on what we have available causes us to come to a decision on our choices, and that 
decision has won our pick or choice.  Our choice has won. 

Those choices can also lose.

We can make the wrong decision.  Our affections can cause us to make the wrong choice.  Even though the choice won our affection, thus winning, it can be the wrong decision, thus losing.

Not a big deal if it is meatloaf.

A huge deal if it is family…

…love…

…belief.


To muddy the water further, it is actually possible to make the correct choice overall but make some incorrect choices within the main choice.  This is where we find luke-warmness, tepidity if you will, in life, love, family, and belief. 

So in review, choice wins our decision.  Our decision may be wrong or right.  Even if our decision is correct, there can be incorrect decisions made after that, which could be incorrect.

Think of it as a path.  You may start off the journey on the path making the right decision to turn right, but then there is another turn, and another, and another.  Can we make the correct decision every time?  Is there a map?  Even with a map, I would surely make a poor decision somewhere along the journey.

No matter how my mind is made up on the choice I have made, I might be wrong, and certainly, somewhere in the midst of this journey of life, I will be wrong. 

Newsflash:  This just in, I will mess up in my life.

I will mess up in my marriage…

…my job…

…parenting…

…and even in what I believe.

What happens when I find out I have made a poor decision?

What happens when the Chicken Parmesan turns into something more like Chicken jerky?

Usually, you are presented with another choice.

The hope is that there is grace from those that are affected by the decision.

Is there ever a time when…well, there isn’t more time to make a decision?

Therein lays a recent debate…

…and actually…another choice.
 
If there is always time to make a choice, and sooner or later you will make the right choice…is that really a choice?

I mean, sooner or later you will come to this understanding…it doesn’t feel much like choice.

It kind of feels like even if I resist, I must end up making Spaghetti. 

What would that look like for our beliefs?

If love wins, is it forced?

A “you’ll love me or I will make you love me?”

Choice wins…and loses.

1 comment:

Kelsea said...

Ah, choices and decisions. Two things that I never really liked. This was a really good blog post that got me thinking about my own fear of indecision. I wrote about it and wanted to thank you for reminding me that there will be decisions in life. We may make good choices or we may make bad choices, but we can't let the fear of the unknown stop us from making decisions at all. We could be missing out on a lot that God has for us by refusing to take a step into the unknown.