Before we get into talking about the real choice we all have, let us do a simple exercise. Since we recently celebrated International Day Of Yoga ( On June 21st), let us try a simple breathing exercise.

Exercise 1:
Inhale..
Hold for 3 seconds..
Exhale…
Easy isn’t it!

Exercise 2:
Now, inhale..
Hold for as long as you can..
When you just cannot hold it anymore, Exhale..
What a relief, isn’t it!

Exercise 3:
Inhale..
Hold it. Keep telling yourself that you can exhale whenever you want, but you choose to hold your breath.
Exhale when you feel like it.

The third exercise becomes a completely different experience. What made it different? We will get to it by the end of this article. So, keep reading.

I am going to open a can of worms here by talking about choices, during times like this. The obvious question being, what choice do we have, after all? Some parts of the world is slowly reopening with caution. Others are closing their borders. The bright summer days and cozy winter days around the world did not bring the usual charm that it does every year. The busy airport lounges look like sad paintings. Every person has a list of things that he/she had to put aside. So, what is the choice we have?

We definitely do not have a choice it terms of changing these situations that are beyond our control. In fact, did we ever have that choice?
Oh, the great debate of free will vs determinism…..
That is another can of worms and I shall put it aside for another time. Even if we assume situations like the one that we are currently in, as a random occurrence, what choice do we have now?

A spiritual teacher once told , “The real choice that you always have is the choice of thoughts you entertain. And that choice cannot be taken away from you.” From that perspective, we do have a choice right now, don’t we.

Coming back to the exercises we did, the only difference between exercise 2 and exercise 3 was in the choice of thoughts you entertained and that made the whole experience very different.

There are two aspects to this conversation on choice:
1. The realization that we have a choice is very powerful by itself:
2. The way we exercise that choice by selecting thoughts that help us: Like Spidey said, “With great power comes great responsibilities.” Now, it becomes our responsibility to choose to entertain the right thoughts. Thoughts are not anymore just some random visitors that came in and stay anytime without our permission. They can be kicked out or in depending on what we choose to do. The power here being whether we want to entertain them and if we do, for how long?

When we go to a store to buy fruits, we always pick the best ones. Why would anyone choose a rotten fruit that could cause discomfort and disease? Similarly, if we were aware of the power of thoughts we choose to entertain every second, we would all make the right choices. We wouldn’t choose those rotten thoughts thats cause us discomfort and disease.

Ever since I heard the line ” The real choice that you always have is the choice of thoughts you entertain” , and thought and re thought about the line itself, I have fallen in love with it. I want to kick out thoughts that I know I don’t want to entertain. It will take a lot of practice to do it every time. Even if we do it a couple of times every hour, I would say it is worth it.

Exercise Your Real Choice!

Image by Alfonso Cerezo from Pixabay

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