The Choices I Choose

See what you have done now Ms.Sassy? You got three people writing about Choices just because of your one blog. :) If you think you don't affect people, if you think what you have to say doesn't matter, if you think what you do doesn't matter...boy are you wrong. And I don't mean to say this just to Ms. Sassy either. I mean everyone needs to be aware of that. You matter. The choices you make matter. For you, your children, your friends and those around you, more than you ever could know or realize.

Ms.Sassy made me think about my choices in life. I have made some hard decisions in life that affected my children, that affected my relationship with them, that affect my friends and the choices I made could and have ended or broken our friendship or made them stronger, and I have made choices that affected my life for the better to make me stronger and wiser and confident.

But what about the choices we didn't choose? Did those choices take any less part in shaping us or molding us to become who we are today? What about those hard choices in life that were made for us by others, but what about the choices the universe made or a higher power?

I did not choose to be a child of divorce. I did not choose to lose a father when I was 10 years old. I did not choose to be moved around the states after he passed away. I did not choose to grow up alone. I did not choose to be offended on when I was young. I did not choose to be taken when I was 18 years old. I did not choose to go to proms and dances alone. I did not choose to struggle as a mother. I did not choose to be abused as a wife. I did not choose to be mistreated as a friend. I did not choose lose all I had in a business. I did not choose to be homeless for awhile.

I did not choose to suffer.

These choices and many others sadly were chosen for me. These choices in some were taken from me. These choices robbed me of my childhood and made me grow up way too fast. These choices stole my youth. These choices dearly and deeply affected me.

I DID choose to LIVE.

I chose to smile in the face of adversity. I chose to laugh when no one was laughing. I chose to forgive and forget and move on. I chose to be free and happy despite it all. I chose to endure through the trials. I chose to have tolerance through the pain. I chose to have patience while God was working in my life. I chose to make a difference in the lives of others. I chose to be me.


I chose to SURVIVE.

See my belief is that life happens. It does. There are times when there are things that we have control over. We make the choice. We decide. But there are times that there are no choices and I truly think those are the harder things to deal with. You can smack your own hand when you make a bad choice, but how do you handle it when you have no choice?

How do you keep going? How do you keep living? What makes you want to get up in the morning? How are handling your life and the choices around it, the ones you made and the ones you didn't?

You have the choice to turn it around. Stuff happens. Sometimes it sucks. Sometimes it sucks big rocks. Sometimes you want to throw your fist at the wind. Sometimes you want to crawl under the covers of life. But if you chose to let the choices you didn't chose over affect you, then you are not choosing to live.

I have had one crappy life. Much has happen to me. But I also have had the best life ever. Those choices I didn't choose formed me and shaped me and molded me and made me who I am today. Those choices were the rough I had to go through to be a diamond! I am so thankful for all the choices good and bad, ones I had to control over and not. I do not wish them on others nor wish they would have happened to me but they did, turn the page, flip the switch and move on.

Choose Life.

Are you letting the choices of your life AFFECT you...or are you letting it help you make and EFFECT on others?

It is up to you...

I choose JOY! :)