Your Choice. You Choose

Are you aware that choice begins with creation? Which creation is open for us to comprehend?

Around the time when a baby is born, there are many choices made, externally and internally. The parents of the baby, and the near and dear ones, choose bedding, clothes, other material things required. Adding to it is the temperament which they choose (consciously/unconsciously) for innumerable reasons which they know best. At the same time, there is the presence of emotions of such an event. In this interaction, the baby’s likes, dislikes, the comfort of certain things beside it and many other things are discovered. We can mention these momentary choices observed, but what goes behind these choices is for us to wonder, observe and remark its beauty and accept that there are choices to be made.

Some choices are cherished for years to come. For instance, a mother says, “My child loved this toy”, and keeps it for remembrance in a beautiful suitcase though she knows that her baby has grown up and would not play with it anymore. Some choices are made concerning important decisions of our life, some as a momentary daily exercise that we count as mundane. Some are in combinations and many more choices that each one of us can think of.

Let us talk about our choices which are considered mundane. Yet, they are significant and occur almost every day in one’s life with the hidden power to make a difference in people’s lives involved in that situation. Let me narrate one such story of my life.

That particular day, I had to travel to my college, which would take around 15 minutes for me, excluding the steps to get down to catch an auto and later reach my classroom. I stepped out of my home and had two choices. It would be walking myself down the stairs or using the elevator. At that moment, I was clouded with the thought of losing my flab. So I ran down the stairs. Once I reached down my apartment, I moved forward with my usual pace to catch an auto standing in front of me. Still, at that moment, another auto had crossed my way and was waiting for my response.

I had a choice to choose an auto driven by an old man or the other auto driven by a young man. The young auto driver was standing in my way towards the other auto and another man reading a newspaper who had just noticed me. The other was still waiting for my response. My response was to choose the auto which was close to me. Later, I realized it would have been helpful if I had chosen the other auto driven by the old man. By my decision, maybe the old man would have again experienced the deep wound of being worn out tirelessly driving auto for years. It is what I had perceived, which could not necessarily be what was going on in the old man’s mind. But what is interesting is how one’s choice has the power to affect someone present in that individual situation, and the curiosity that the choices we make are based on what?. But we now know that we choose to choose and that can be termed as freedom for us?

Coming out of home experiencing silence, the road seemed catastrophic. The misery of poverty, the honking of vehicles, the air which I thought could strangle me this moment, the race to win over one another, the beauty of Lalbagh which I could feel amidst all this chaos and then I noticed something, I saw few men of foreign descent dressing specifically by their culture and carrying huge backpacks with a smile on their face. Nothing seemed inevitable to them. A moment could definitely have a huge impact, and they moved ahead—a celebration of a life-the way of life.