Have you ever gone through a phase in your life when you have felt as if your life was being controlled, rather then you controlling your life? Sometimes we can find ourselves in a space when life just seems to happen. It is as if we are living our life on autopilot. I have a friend who tells me that periodically when she is driving she is not sure how she got from point A to B, she just did. She got in the car and she arrived. Those two points she is conscious of; the time between A and B her brain was on autopilot. She said she is surprised she has never had an accident.
Sadly, sometimes it seems that some people seem to live their life in this manner. At some point in our lives, either we consciously choose to direct our lives or we relinquish control allowing external circumstances and forces to control it for us. When we consciously choose to direct our lives, then we are in charge of every step in our journey. Even when we are navigating difficult terrain, we are the ones making decisions about what next. When we do not, we tend to lose our footing and can easily fall and struggle to get back up again.
Each moment we have the opportunity to choose to think, speak, and make decisions for ourselves or allow others to do it for us. While it might seem tempting for a second to want to have one of those lives where we do not need to make any choices because we know we are going to be well taken care of. The reality is that we also live in a state of dependence and fear. When we surrender our power to others, then we are dependent on them to support and provide for us. When we choose to make our own decisions and direct our own life, then we put ourselves first and have faith in our lives and abilities.
Choosing to take control of your life gives you the freedom to liberate yourself from the prevailing undertow of societal ideologies. When we relinquish that control, it is as if we allow ourselves to get swept out to sea with everyone else. We lose our footing on solid ground. We lose our sense of where we are, where we have come from, and where we are going. Rather then have the freedom to stand tall and firm in the ocean of life, the undertow pulls us farther away from where we once stood making it difficult, if sometimes impossible to get back to shore.
When we are not consciously choosing to direct our lives, it becomes easier for us to be swept up in the undertow of others. whether it is their personal drama and trauma, religious doctrine which ask us to surrender what we believe out of a sense of spiritual discipline, or the adoption of a belief system which encourages us to believe things about others which is contrary to what we know to be true.
When we fail to choose to consciously direct our lives, we lose our power to control our lives, but we can also lose the sense of who we were created to be; who is our authentic self? When we choose, there is no guarantee that we will not have to navigate challenging times in our life. It does, however, guaranteed we will be in control of who we choose to be, what we choose to believe, how we choose to behave, and what direction our life moves. So the question for us to contemplate is do we choose or lose? What are you going to do?