#FirstCoffeeThoughts
Something I feel I’m constantly kind of correcting people on is the difference between not having choice and not liking options.
This is similar to people thinking that their thoughts and emotions are somehow the exact same things … they aren’t just FYI.
For many people thinking FOLLOWS emotional states which is not the best way to travel one’s path.
Regardless, they aren’t the same.
There are things that people want to believe with 100% of their whole being because they HAVE to believe them because if they don’t, they have to rethink everything in their entire lives; all their choices, all their beliefs, and at the same time they have to take accountability for things they have done under the power of that false belief.
That is hard for people especially when they reach a certain age … when they would have to look back at way too many years and realize hard truths.
You have the ability to choose.
No one can take away your ability to make choices about the things that are within your control.
The reason many people do not make choices is because they don’t like their options, not because they don’t have the ability or freedom to choose.
Choosing between three bad choices is not something many people want to do, they would rather not choose at all rather than choose the “lesser of three evils” and then they call it “no choice”.
But, there is choice.
𝙘𝙝𝙤𝙞𝙘𝙚: an act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities.
𝙤𝙥𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣: a thing that is or may be chosen.
People often have the chance to make choices and make decisions based on the choices they make, but the problem often is in the options they have at their disposal.
People are waiting for the options to be clear or ideal or, more accurately, they are waiting for choices to be ones where they don’t have to make any sacrifices or lose anything …
In Stoic philosophy the ONLY thing we can control is our own behavior and choices. The choices you make determine your character.
Epictetus said: 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘧𝘶𝘭, 𝘴𝘰 𝘵𝘰𝘰 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘣𝘦 and that is essentially correct but what happens when the options you have to choose from aren’t beautiful? What happens when your options are just lesser forms of awfulness?
If the choices you make determine your character, then who are you if you make no choices except when one benefits you?
When people say, “I didn’t have a choice.” that tells me something instantly about them.
It tells me that they didn’t like their options and refused to make a choice because it would lose them something that they weren’t willing to part with or it would cause them to have to accept things that they didn’t want to accept.
So they say they had no choice at all … they give up their freedom of choice with a delusion about what “choice” actually means and reshape the definition of the word.
Everyone has choice, you just don’t always have choice over the options available for you to choose from.
There is a difference between being DENIED choice and simply not liking what is presented for you to decide upon.
I have met people that don’t understand this idea and they have this belief ingrained into their minds as some kind of Preferred Connotation instead of an etymological truth of what “choice” actually means in it’s entirety.
They choose delusion; a denial of reality.
There are some things, a lot of things, that we have absolutely NO CONTROL over and I find that most people direct almost all of their energy into those things, instead of into things that they can actually change and/or make decisions about.
It’s easier for people to pretend to be fighting imaginary battles that have no solutions than it is for them to face the truth of their own deluded understandings of what choices they CAN actually make that do effect their reality.
Because of fear.
𝙁𝙚𝙖𝙧 𝙞𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙙-𝙠𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙧. 𝙁𝙚𝙖𝙧 𝙞𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙩𝙡𝙚-𝙙𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙗𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨 𝙩𝙤𝙩𝙖𝙡 𝙤𝙗𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣.
Nearly every negative emotion, including anger, is an offshoot of fear. Angry people are fearful and have weak minds afraid of truth, exposure, and shame.
But the fact is that the more comfortable you become with your fears, the more you know yourself and accept who you are and hold accountability for the choices you make, the less apt you will be to express things through irrational emotions like anger.
Making a choice changes the direction of your life and shifts your reality.
You alter your path or someone else’s or many people’s paths and you now are accountable for everything that follows that chain or events; the consequences of that choice cannot be reversed and can be traced back to your choice.
Given what I just said about fear guiding the course of many people’s lives, the idea of being accountable for the ripple effects of one choice are unbearable to many people.
No one is limiting your choices, they are controlling your options which in turn makes you feel trapped … and whomever is doing that is aware of that fact.
That is how most people are controlled by oppressive people, policies, and grooming; they are given terrible options and made to feel that any choice is a loss. That fear of loss cripples you and keeps you from ever exerting your freedom to choose and control your own fate.
Oppressors and oppressive systems control through fear.
Remember what I said about expending energy into things you have no control over instead of focusing your energy on things you do?
One of the choices people willingly make all the time is giving power to oppressive people and systems.
One of the biggest expenditures of energy is all the time wasted on allowing these people and systems to control your actions, your body, your mind, and your future.
That is a choice.
Because there ARE other options, many just fear the consequences of change.
Everything you do, online and off, is a choice you are making.
To write something in a post, to attack someone in their own feed, to argue with some irrational, angry person, to share your thoughts with others, to share who you are and your truth, to deny someone’s lived reality, to center yourself in someone else’s thread, to hurt someone else because you are hurting … these are all different choices you are making that determine your character.
You have CHOICES.
Choose wisely.
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