The Northeast is still recovering from a pre-Halloween freak snowstorm that left millions without power and caused many millions of dollars in damage. My back deck looked like a bad day in mid-January of a bad winter, blanketed nearly a foot-deep in snow. Our nearby trees were cracked, split, and splintered in an eerie tableaux of strangely beautiful destruction.
Many people were without heat or power for a week and more through sub-freezing nights. People responded to the unexpected challenge of the cold and chaos with a broad spectrum of moods and temperaments. While some people raged at the late-coming utility workers trying to restore power, others cheered them and brought them cookies.
The different reactions to the same experience got me thinking about choice. Both groups, and those in between, were cold and frustrated, both had had enough and were at their wits’ end. Those who took out their frustration with aggressive confrontation made one choice, while the cookie-bringers made another. They faced the challenge differently.
Of course, we all need challenges, and most people find an unchallenging life boring and stifling. At the same time, few people like their creature comfort disturbed. A nice challenge at work that I can use to climb the corporate ladder, a challenging sport to test my mettle, a challenging conversation with a friend to stimulate my thinking – these we deem good. Mother Nature whacking us upside the head or shaking us out of our boots, threatening life, limb, or property – definitely not good. We like our challenges to have some choice involved; we want some control.
The thing is, many challenges in life afford us no choice. Bam! Something happens, and the only control we have is whether we deal with it, resist it, avoid it or come out swinging. I’m not judging what’s the right way or wrong way, because frankly, I don’t think there’s a one-size-fits-all response to the wide array of challenges we face.
For instance, when a child is abused, somebody ought to be angry and hold the abuser accountable; somebody else ought to bring comfort to the child. And somebody ought to teach the abuser another way to handle his or her fear and rage. As another example, after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, some chose to fight “big oil” in both court and the court of public opinion, some chose to get their hands dirty and clean up the mess, some chose to seek legislative safeguards, some chose to sue, and some to pray.
Some choose confrontation, some choose cookies.
The point, I believe, is to make the choice that feels authentic and right to you, the choice that helps you stand tall and square in the truth of the person you aspire to be. After the dust settles, as it eventually does, will you be able to look back and say “in that moment I chose to be my best?” Is your heart in your response to the challenge? Can you act with confidence in your choice? It is not about what they will say is right, because they will come and go from your life. Rather, it’s about what you will say.
The choices we make from our inner knowing, heart, essence, conscience – whatever we might call it – empower us, they make us bigger than we might have been otherwise. They invite our enthusiasm, that is, our inspiration, intensity, divinity. That helps us to be clear, focused, on point, and centered in our values. As a result, we can face our challenges with a directness and simplicity that doesn’t make the challenge worse, as fear can and usually will do.
So, now the storm is past. My wife and I were among fortunate few who did not lose power. For us, it was easy this time to choose cookies – enthusiastically opening our home to those who needed a shower, a meal, the laundry, charging their electronics. We cleaned away some debris. We listened to harrowing stories. Simple efforts. That we could do so meant something to us and to those partook of our hospitality. Next time, roles may be reversed. I hope we can meet that challenge with a similar enthusiastic attitude and simple effort.