Choices

Choices

Ever since I studied the martial art Tae Kwon Do with my daughters way back when, I have pondered creating a simple graphic to model the choices we, as humans, face every day. I regard making choices with positive outcomes to be a skill just like every other, and I often wondered why some people seem to automatically, on balance, make beneficial choices, while others seem to complicate their lives with choices that generally result in negative outcomes for themselves and others around them.

Why do some people wind up alone, sick, alcoholic and living in a cardboard box? Yes, I agree that some folks are born into affluence while some are disadvantaged by poverty. But, conversely, some wealthy people make choices that render them on the skids, while some poor kids wind up being successful adults with many choices to make, most of them good choices.

So, I think I’ve finally “cracked the code” with this iconic, minimalistic chart I came up with yesterday. I purposefully decided not to use words on the chart since I’m a visual kind of bloke and I think icons are more universal in that they are not so connected to more parochial interpretations colored by nationality, religion, gender, etc. My chart does, however, require some explanation since it reduces common experience and the choices life presents to each person to a bare minimum usually not associated with issues of human behavior and psychology.

The upper left-hand box represents what other people want or expect you to do. Into this category we can put school, work, family responsibilities, civil laws, etc. Basically things that you might not choose to do but you must.

The upper right-hand corner box represents what your ego does for self gratification, like hobbies, who we choose to befriend, choosing what we wear, eat and are entertained by - the list goes on and on. When you choose to do what you want, it fits here.

The lower left box includes those actions or occurrences in the universe that “work”. The yin and yang symbol connotes balance and harmony. I put things like love, respect, laughter, nature, pleasure, compassion, giving, etc. in this category because to me it means that life is good, and is what most sane people strive for.

The lower right-hand box symbolizes what doesn’t work in the universe as we experience it, like hate, war, violence, pain, greed, insanity, stealing, bullying or what most folks detest and shun - outcomes that don’t work for most people.

The active operating factor in my chart is found in the arrows between each box because they represent the conscious choices we humans make hundreds of times every day and the directions, intentional or unintentional, our resulting actions can take.

For example, we typically choose to work for others (upper left hand box) so that we can make income to eat and clothe ourselves and our loved ones, and have money to spend to provide “what works” (in the lower left-hand box). But also on the chart you can see that there is an arrow from the upper left hand box to the upper right-hand box because in this case we WANT to work for someone else who will tell us what to do so we can get what it is that we REALLY WANT - thus the arrow between the upper right-hand box to the lower left-hand box.

As I hope you can see, there are also connections from the same boxes to the unwanted lower right - hand box because sometimes, even though we think we are choosing some action to result in one positive outcome, it can result in unexpected and unwanted negative outcomes.

I think what is so revealing about my chart is that life’s choices are not very complicated since you do get to choose most of what happens to you, but you can never predict 100% what the outcome will be.

I conclude from this that the trick to making good choices most of the time is to know that this is mainly how choices work and to look as far ahead as you can while realizing that the arrow of the actions you are taking run in two directions and can change direction at any time.

So, choose wisely and expect the unexpected. 

If you have faith, as many do, that there is such a thing as fate, or the will of God, or that things are pre-ordained by nature and that your personal choices really don’t matter in the long run, then my chart might mean nothing to you.

But, if you live in the moment, and take responsibility for your own actions, this chart may have some relevance to you if only as a reminder of whom is responsible for your life - YOU! Please feel free to copy the chart with this link and put it on your desk or refrigerator. It might spark some interesting conversations.