Un-Choosing

The sky is not wondering about last year’s storm

I’ve spent most of my life wondering if I made the right choice or if I was about to make the right choice.

But I don’t think life actually works this way. Is there really a “right” choice? Some of my worst decisions have led to beautiful outcomes, profound learning, or unexpected and wild adventures. Does that then make them good decisions?

Or how about the countless times I’ve considered every possible outcome, made a choice based on logic and collective wisdom and what, by all accounts, seemed very “right”, and yet it all went to shit.

I’ve fallen victim to worshiping the god of the “correct” answer.

I think this kind of thinking is a shadow-side of the first-wave feminist culture I was raised in, paired with my white privilege and the force-fed American Dream narrative. The story was: I could be and do anything I put my mind to, I just had to make the right choices.

That’s a whole lot of pressure for a 7-year-old. And a whole bag of lies about how much control we actually have over life. It leads to grinding toward achievement. Hustling hard to try and strong-arm life into a vision we’ve imagined for ourselves. It leads to endless nights lying awake, chewing over what to do next or fixating on the path not taken.

Life is gonna life. There will be incredible opportunities and devastating heartbreak. There will be love, joy, and success—and there will be struggle, fear, and grief. While some of us have more access and cushioning to fall back on, I don’t believe our choices can truly protect us from any of it.

Where is the unfolding? The emergence? Where is the whisper of our souls reminding us of our beauty, no matter which path we take?

What if I decide to sit right here at the crossroads and take a nap under the shade of an acacia tree, with the dandelions and ladybugs as company? Wait until I’m moved to take one path or the other.

What if, even for those whose full-time job is survival, this un-choosing became a radical act, even in just a momentary pause?

What if, instead, I began to trust myself fully? Believe the feeling in my body. Follow my instincts and listen to the quiet guidance of my soul. What if I held the knowing in my bones that whatever life brings, I can meet it with an open heart and respond in a way that feels most grounded and most true?

And maybe that’s enough. To wander this winding life path, trusting it’s the right one, simply because it’s the one we’re on.

I can feel myself questioning this wisdom, wondering if it might excuse apathy or a nervous system freeze. Learning to discern between maladapted protection and intuition takes time, especially when we’ve been trained by trauma to brace for harm—especially when both live embedded in our bodies. But even the gentlest whisper from within is worth listening for.

Because the earth is a living, breathing, fertile ecosystem, and we, individually and collectively, are embedded in her rhythms. The waves aren’t choosing to crash. The sky isn’t wondering about last year’s storm. The great blue whale and the monarch don’t plan their migration path; they just know it. The acorn doesn’t hyper-fixate on becoming a giant oak; it simply reaches for the sun.

Many of us have been taught to override this knowing. But we still have this same wisdom. This same truth. Our oversized brains and knee-jerk impulses get in the way of discerning what’s being said. Still, the knowing remains, in the tension in your shoulders, the recognition in your sacrum, the subtle nudge you feel to move in one way or another, in the way that your breath steadies when you lean into truth.

Look up to the sky. Find a patch of earth. And if that feels like too much, hold a rock in your hand. Feel it’s weight. Remember its story. And listen for your own.

I’m so glad you’re here.
xo.a