I was recently talking to a colleague about his 24-year old daughter’s umpteenth edit on her resume.  In passing, he said something about the fact that, because of school, she was still looking for that one answer that was the RIGHT answer! 

What a powerful awareness!!  Although I’d long felt that our fear of being wrong often interrupted our ability to move in ANY direction, I hadn’t made the link to all those years of schooling, where success came only through identifying the correct answer.

While the right answer might apply when it comes to math and science (and I’m not  positive it is still 100% true in those fields either), it certainly doesn’t apply to all those other subjects where it’s our ability to think, reason, and arrive at a legitimate response that are the keys to success.  And those skills are the ones we need to live a happy, fulfilled life.

There are many paths we could take through life. Each one hinges on a choice, whether conscious or not.  I believe the most important thing is to keep MOVING through life, not to come to a standstill while you analyze your choices to death for fear of making the wrong one (analysis paralysis, anyone?).  That isn’t living, that is ‘thinking about living’.

Another offshoot of this legacy is the fact that we are led to believe that there is a “right” way to live and a “wrong” way.  The root of most prejudice (no matter who or what you are prejudiced against) stems from the fact that we believe we have picked the “right” way to live.  Because the only choice to “not right” is “wrong”, there is no in-between.  The prejudice  actually stems from our fear that we ARE wrong.  Many of us can not cope with this idea, or even get our heads around it.  It’s so much easier just to dislike anyone who isn’t a carbon copy of us in at least most of our self-beliefs. By default, making THEM wrong, makes US right.

For a long time, I’ve used the phrase “Forever is for as long as it feels right” to help me move through some otherwise paralyzing choices, allowing me to take a deep breath and forge ahead.  I think a new mantra I will use is to look for “the right answer FOR NOW”.  Knowing I can change my mind at any time, as I gain new knowledge to confirm or rethink my choice, I don’t need to sit around forever hoping I’ll make the RIGHT choice.  This is especially freeing since there IS NO RIGHT CHOICE!

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