It's What You Believe

What direction do I move in? This is a question that we might ask ourselves at almost every waking moment, whether consciously or unconsciously. I would like to propose that we are always making choices, in every moment. Other than our heart beating and other basic life giving automation that goes on in a part of the brain that doesn’t require our conscious effort, we make all the decisions in our body and our life. We decide how to breathe: fast, slow, deep, shallow. We decide how to act and how to be and we decide what kind of life we have. Just because you are born into one life does not mean that you are “destined” to stay there but still, it might feel like you have no choice and all that is known to you creates this fact. Is it a real fact though? What are those known points that make it a fact? How do we know for sure that we are making the absolute best decision? What do you believe to be true?

We choose what it is to feel and understand an experience and then we decide what to do about it, in other words, what action to take, therefore, what precedes action, because it precedes choice, is belief. For instance, if your belief system incorporated creative thought, individuality and autonomy and you felt suppressed in some way, by someone, an organization or a political/religious doctrine, your options might be to accept and abide, to not accept but abide anyway or to not accept or abide and making any one of these decisions is taking action. You make a choice and you take action and inaction is still a choice.This is what it all ends up being about, taking action or not taking action. This activity of deciding can take seconds, minutes, hours, days or years.

Therefore, it’s what you believe that lies at the root because it will inform your decision and your choosing. What you believe is how you decide to take action. Yes, it can and often does change throughout the course of your life. Your beliefs change and then maybe your choices change and possibly your path changes.

We can save ourselves or we can move into the fire. I believe that can be seen in the reverse as well, meaning we can move into the fire or we can save ourselves. To illustrate the first experience, you walk by a stranger, lying on the ground and realize that she needs CPR. You have a choice, you can continue walking and save yourself from getting any diseases, maybe doing physical harm, while attempting to save her life or you can move into the fire, by feeling scared and getting dirty, vulnerable and unsure and then possibly feeling the exhilaration of providing support, being with humanity, having faith and saving a life. By moving into the fire you are recognizing that even though you don’t know what kind of outcome will appear, you trust that you are making the right decision, based on your belief system, at that moment. You are consciously aware through mind, body and/or spirit of what feels right, this is how you gather the information to make a decision.

As we look at the reverse and we say that you can move into the fire using an example of experiencing drug use in a situation that is fraught with peer pressure, might be under dangerous conditions and could possibly cause great harm or you save yourself by walking away from that peer group and seek safer circumstances to explore and participate in. In this case you are walking away to do the “right” thing and make the right decision. The determination that this is the right thing, whereas, in the other instance walking away was the wrong thing, leaving someone to possibly die. There is the perception that to save ourselves we do the walking away versus the moving into.

Walking away from danger whether it is known or not and deciding whether or not you think it’s truly dangerous, is when you decide that you find it to be a positive or negative choice. I could argue that the crazy, drug party is a great learning experience and there was no harm that would came of it and that walking away would have you lose a valuable lesson. There is no way to see into the future and therefore know how things turn out to know if we made the right decision except for belief.

One could say that this is all about judgment, how a decision is made and whether or not it was the best decision because right and wrong is a judgement. How do you make that decision for yourself? Who is judging you? Yourself? Parents? Peers? An organization? What is the “general rule”? How does judgement fold into the belief?

It would seem that what is revealed after the decision is made, the action is taken and you are experiencing your life would point to what feels right. Are you living a life that flows, feels at ease and connected or do you feel disconnected, where things show up as challenging, difficult or painful, hardships such as loss of loved ones, pain and injury, financial struggles or disease. How do you journey through these life experiences and therefore perceive them?

This life is about what you see, feel and understand and what you believe because then you will take action. It’s all about an experience, this journey of human life so I hold that we should be the explorers and scientists of our lives: to notice, be a witness and not judge. What if we are willing to fail and yet believe that we won’t? What would we be able to do?

Make a choice and take action. Be in your life.

I believe that we have been making choices all along, including the choice that brought us into this life of being human. What I presume is that we chose this life to serve our growth, therefore I conclude that we continue to choose our way through life to enable this growth to happen.

I don’t believe that it’s about destiny per say except that maybe when we make a choice we choose a path and yet what shows up on the path are the unanticipated options that come along for us to go through in this dichotomy of walk away or move in.

I believe that there is power to be found when stepping into the choice to believe in something, to have conviction and to follow through.

What do you believe?