Choosing is winning

Recently I read an interesting post at Levelieze about all the choices that we have in our lives and whether we don't have too many choices.

It triggered some reflection and some irritation that I recently felt when watching young adults in a reality house searching tv show who wanted everything: with a low income many rooms, a house ready to move in without any renovations to do, a cheap house, a big garden, a perfect location etc.   I was just watching and rolling my eyes.  All those unrealistic expectations. I remember Maartje Luif also having an interesting post when she was searching a home and she compared it to a enormous quiz with a lot of axes of choices and you have to put X marks. But you can't put marks everywhere, you have to make a choice.

In all of this I had to think of so many posts where young adults struggle to hold up all the balls. So I replied to Levelieze that I don't think we have too many choices. I think we fail to make choices.  I think many people want to put X marks on every option but that is unrealistic and in the end they lose.  So chosing is not losing...choosing is winning.

It's great that we have choices to work part-time or full-time, that we can search for ambitious careers, that we can choose for a good family life, that we can participate in many sports, that we can volunteer and give something back to society, that we can contribute to a better climate by crafting a lot of ecological things, we can choose for a healthy  lifestyle with good healthy home cooking, we can explore the world and travel lots, we can do self-care and plan quiet me-time, we can participate in book challenges and see all the recommended Netflix series, ...


We can do so many things and that's great. But we can't do it all at the same time! That is too many balls. They will only drop over the floor.  Not choosing (or choosing but not accepting that each choice has consequences and rules out other choices) is setting yourself up for failure and disappointment.


If you want to work on your career....great, do it, go for it. But you probably won't be at the school gates when the bell rings each day to pick up your children.  In that case it's fine to use the care options available.  You'll show your children how you can fulfill your professional dreams and how you can solve organisational issues etc. 
But if you want to be there with more time for your family, those are also choices you can make.  You'll bond and have quality time...but probably less money to live in your dream villa or probably with less money and vacation days to travel the world each year.

You can have a career with lots of travel but then probably you can't have a hobby that requires you to train in the club 3 times a week.

You can work in your extensive vegetable garden and provide heathy meals each day and save money etc, but you will have less time to combine that with 1000 other time consuming hobbies.

It's not the problem that we have a lot of choices. It's a problem if we fail to make choices. It's a problem if we fail to realise that we can't have it all at the same time. Not everything can be a priority.

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