CHOICES AND DECISIONS – WHY AND HOW

Gary GruberAging Career Celebrations Change Gratitude Growth LifeCHOICES AND DECISIONS – WHY AND HOW
August 31 , 2019 /

CHOICES AND DECISIONS – WHY AND HOW

Every day we have this privilege to decide how we will spend or invest it, how we will give ourselves over to it through time, energy, effort, thought, feelings and perhaps most visible of all, behavior.  For starters, do you consider this day a privilege or a gift or is it more of a job and a task?  Burden or blessing?  A gift of unexplained grace or an agenda with anxiety as to how it will go and how you will do?  For most, it is probably not one or the other but some mysterious combination of what we are free to choose to be and do and what we believe we must be and do.

How you answer those questions at the start of another day will, in large measure, help determine what kind of day you are going to have.  The attitude with which you start will likely carry through unless there is a conscious effort to make a shift if you are uncomfortable going forward.  That we have the ability for self-examination and conscious reflection is in itself a choice, or not, as the case may be.  If you think it is either/or, consider both/and.

Stop for a moment and ask this question. Why am I the way I am right now, in this very moment?  What am I thinking, how am I feeling?  Am I looking ahead or am I in this present moment, consciously aware of myself and my surroundings?  Are my thoughts and feelings with me about myself or am I looking ahead to what I think I must do next or even later today?

What have I brought to this moment in time?  Is it the beginning, middle or end of the day?  How does that influence and shape my thoughts, feelings and behaviors?

Am I influenced more by internal or external motivation and desires?  Again, it’s not an either/or proposition unless we focus entirely on one or the other.  Have you developed a personal philosophy that you can articulate for yourself and others?  Why did you do that?  Or why did you not do that?  Has it changed over the years?  Yes or no?  Yes and no? More yes than no or more no than yes?

Would you like to make a shift right now one way or the other?  Why?  Why not?  On and on it goes, where it stops, nobody knows.  And there you have it. The decades roll on until they don’t.  How will you grace this day or if it’s past how did you do?  Conscious decisions, conscious choices, each one and all yours to own, assess and celebrate. Go for it!

 

 

Comments (2)

  1. One thing that this post does so beautifully is to ground us, your reader, in the power of questions to get clear in this moment. I often hear that it’s questions that keep people awake at night but the truth is, they need to find another pathway forward, often in the form of another question that takes moves them towards action from a more powerful place. Frequently, people know what they want to do but have no idea why they’re not making meaningful progress towards their goal. Yes, it’s about making choices and also understanding not only the what and how but also the why.

    Alli

    1. Thanks. Your good response often elicits more thoughts from me such as not only why, what and how but also where and when, especially when asking questions as a coach. You know also that the answer to a question is often another question which takes us farther along that path. Do you know the exercise of The Five Whys? The 5 Whys is a technique used in the Analyze phase of the Six Sigma DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) methodology. … By repeatedly asking the question “Why” (five is a good rule of thumb), you can peel away the layers of symptoms which can lead to the root cause of a problem. And so it goes. Cheers to you!

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