Why Good Choices?

Why good choices?  Why not?   Haven’t you ever heard that if you’re going to do something, you might as well do it right?  Well, it’s the same thing with choices.  We’re not talking about preparing a meal or making a dress.  This is your LIFE!    You have the right to make your own choices, but you don’t have the right to choose the consequences.   You may decide to stick your hand in the fire,  but you’re probably going to get burned.   

We’ve all had the opportunity to make choices.  Some of them were not so good.    We’ve allowed other people to influence our lives, and sometimes what seemed like a good idea in the moment, turned out to be a huge mistake.      As a teenager did you ever borrow the family car without permission?   What did your parents do?  They probably took the keys away from you and sent you to your room.  Maybe you were grounded.  Maybe that meant missing the prom or something else that was important to you.  If so, you probably learned a lesson that has stuck with you. 

Other choices turn out to be much more serious.   In fact, they  may be serious enough that they will affect you for the rest of your life.   What if you’re that teenager who borrowed the family car and wrecked it?    Were you drinking?  Texting?  Talking on the phone?  Just simply not paying attention?  Was anyone else harmed, or even killed?  If so, then that changes everything.  Instead of being sent to your room, you were judged according to the laws of the land.  You were probably taken to jail, and maybe even sent to prison, but even that won’t take away the consequences of knowing you injured or ended a life. 

People get married without a guide book and children don’t come with directions.  Parents do the best they can but sometimes they just don’t provide the guidance a child needs.  It’s not generally that they’re bad people.  It’s just that they really just don’t know what a particular child needs.   Sometimes parents have enough problems of their own and just simply don’t have what it takes to be good role models. 

As an example, I had parents who were good people.  Charming, attractive, full of charisma.   My birth was the event of the century for our family.  I was the first child, and the first grandchild for my father’s parents.   I remember everyone thinking I was pretty wonderful.   When I look back at this time in my early childhood, I seem to settle on the happiness and security I felt at about age three.  After that, things started going haywire.   Alcohol played a huge part in the unhappiness of my parents and they decided they just couldn’t stay married.  They still loved each other, but pride had gotten in the way and neither of them were willing (or able)  to make the necessary changes to keep us all together.    By the time I was seven, my parents officially divorced, and my sister and I, along with our father,  went to live with our paternal grandparents.  Thank goodness for grandparents who are willing to step in when there is a need.   They became the parents to all three of us!

Life was good with our grandparents.  In fact, I’m sure my sister would agree that the three years with them were the most secure years of our childhood. 

At the end of those three years, our father remarried and expected a new “mother” to raise us.   Our own mother had moved away, believing that we would be better off without her.   Had she asked me what I thought about that, I would have begged her to stay.  Things weren’t better without her.  This new woman we now lived with didn’t want to raise someone else’s children and she made that pretty clear. 

For me, reading was a way to escape.  I was a good student and didn’t do anything to cause problems.  Being the peacemaker, I smiled on the outside, but inside, I was terribly unhappy.   I dreamed about running away and never coming back.    When I was seventeen, that’s just what I did.   I got married, graduated from high school, and had my first baby in the same year.   Did I know what I was doing?  Heck no!  Do I wish I’d have made better choices?  Absolutely!   That marriage was short-lived and only added to my trials. 

Not only do I have regrets, but  I’ve also suffered with the “what might have been.”      The best thing about it is the daughter who came from it all.   She was always my strength and my reason for living.   The worst thing is what I went through to get to where I am today.   On the outside, I look like a pretty normal person.  There are scars on the inside but they’re barely visible anymore.   They say time heals all wounds, but without love and forgiveness, they will just continue to fester and bleed.  You can apply bandages but until you heal the wound from the inside, it will only continue to cause pain. 

A few things have helped me on my road to freedom.   

1.  Good friends.    If you only have one person you can count on in life, consider yourself blessed.    Two childhood friends appeared when I needed them most and I credit them with my ability to live through the worst time of my life.

2.  Learning the meaning of the Atonement of Jesus Christ in my life.    He suffered not only for my sins (and my lack of good choices) but He also suffered my pain.  Too many times I think we think only of the crucifixion and not the precious gift He offered in the Garden of Gesthemane.  When times get hard, I realize that He truly understands my pain because He has suffered it not only for all mankind, but just for ME.

3.  Making the decision to forgive.   I haven’t forgotten, but I have forgiven.   The memories help me remember how important it is to make the right choices in life.  If I didn’t have them, what would stop me from continuing to make them?   Forgiveness helps remove the pain.  It’s part of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.   He forgave.  If I am unwilling to forgive those who have hurt me, then I am bringing my own condemnation.   Christ will be the one, in the end, to judge.  

3.  Journaling.   Early on, I knew I had to write my story.  The process of recording it had a few benefits.  Therapy for me.  A record for my children.  Now it’s the basis for my first novel, “Saving Nikki.”    It’s the story of a young girl with a good heart who got sucked into a life that forced her to grow up faster than she wanted.     She learned she couldn’t trust  the people who were supposed to love her.     You just have to read it to learn more about her and determine for yourself whether or not she succeeded. 

I don’t know what lead you to this website, but I do know that everyone on this beautiful planet we call Mother Earth has made some choices they regret.   You don’t have to live with a life of pain.  The past does not determine who you are today.    I hope you’ll visit often and feel the healing power of knowing that you’re not alone.   Please  post your own stories in the comments area.  I strongly believe that healing comes from sharing our stories, and our strengths with one another, so the more we can do to share, the stronger we will become. 

Life is full of choices.  Make the right ones. 

Joyce

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