Spiritual Parenting – Choices
Theresa L. Flores, LSW
Choices. Our lives are chock full of choices, each and
every day. Hundreds of millions of them.
Some miniscule, some monumental. Some we
think are small at the time, then turn out to be life changing.
I have come to view Choices like skipping a stone on a lake. You carefully select a pebble, pondering which one is perfectly shaped for the job. Then, with great care, you aim and toss it into the wind. When the pebble hits the water, an impact is created. As the pebble is absorbed into the water, a ripple effect occurs. It continues to move through the water, causing other changes that you didn’t even expect.
As parents, we try to teach our children the importance of making good choices. This is the cornerstone of being a mature, responsible person. But how can you foresee the effects of the choices you make?
Iyanla Vanzant, author of “In the Meantime” puts it all in perspective. She states in her book that we must simply accept the choices we have made. We might not like them. May not choose them again today in hindsight. But YOU made the choice. You made it for a reason. At the time it seemed valid. Give yourself credit for that! Take responsibility for the choices you made. When we do this, it makes it easier to move on. But it also is validating! Freeing. We can’t change our past choices, but we can learn from them!
Many years ago, I got married to a man who seemed a good match. I have to admit, I wasn’t head over heals in love. But he had all the qualities I wanted in a life partner. I made the choice to walk down the aisle. Looking back, not many others thought this was a good choice. But I stuck to it, believing that it was the right choice. Soon afterwards, the pebble started to ripple through the waters,.creating other changes and effects that I didn’t like and didn‘t expect. I accepted many things a person should never have to live with, all due to the choice I had made. Years of verbal, emotional, and at times, physical abuse wore me down. I was no longer able to make any choices in my daily life. They were made for me. I was told what to wear, how to spend money, what to say to whom and where I could go. The option of making choices was taken away from me.
I toyed with the idea of leaving. I calculated on paper where I would live, how I would support three small children on a Social Work income, and how I could get away safely. By the time the paper was full, there seemed to be No real choices. No real answers.
But the day came when I had to choose between life and the possibility of death. I realized I DID have a choice! That no matter how poor I would be, how hard it would be on my own, I owed it to myself, to my Creator, to my soul who assigned me this human body, and to the children entrusted to my by the Creator to make a change. I t was on this day Spirit spoke to me. It told me that I was a valuable person. I was equal. I deserved the best. I felt a warmth flood over me. A hug of love from deep inside warmed me all over. I understood that I DID have a choice to live life fully and be fully loved by myself and Spirit, just because I was ME.
That choice has created many other ripple effects in my life. But it is a choice that I have never doubted. Never regretted. I have learned a great deal from Iyanla’s book. She taught me to accept the choices I have made. Yes, I agreed to walk down the aisle. I chose to stay in the marriage for 10 years. But I did NOT chose to be treated less than what the Creator meant for me.
Sometimes my kids are sad that they don’t have two parents. I tell them that we had a choice. We could have stayed in a life that was abusive. But I made a choice and now we have a fantastic life. We can choose to go to the park, we can eat ice cream for dinner if we want and we can choose to live life fully!
I am proud of all the choices I have made. I may not have made some in hindsight, but I made them. I can’t change that. I accept that. Go forward. Live and Learn.
Make Good Choices Today.
And remember:
1: Accept the choices you have made
2: Learn from all your choices
3: Teach your children what you have learned from your choices
4: Show them that they have choices in everything they do.
5: Teach by example.