Power of Choice

In my pursuit of happiness, I am enamored by “Choice” – choices that we have to make in our lives. Many of us struggle to make a choice and many of us regret the choices that we have made - life turning into struggles and regrets. Infact, many a time, making a choice is so difficult, we give that power away to others, asking them to decide for us.

Why? Why is making a choice in life so difficult? Infact, humans are the only species that have the ability to make a choice. No other species have that ability. Yet, this gift of making a choice is turning into a burden for many of us. That’s because we are caught in the fear of outcomes - worrying about what the right outcome is, and once we decide upon the right outcome, worrying whether we will realize that outcome. Once we achieve the outcome, we lament if there was a different choice that we could have made which would have resulted in a different/better outcome. Why do we live with this constant struggle?

Before we proceed, let me share with you couple of stories.

Story of Viktor Frankl:

Viktor Emil Frankl is an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist. Frankl was born in 1905 in Vienna into a Jewish family of civil servants. He studied medicine at the university of Vienna and later specialized in neurology and psychiatry. During the Second World War, Germany occupied Austria and in 1942, Frankl, his wife and parents were deported to Nazi Ghetto and subsequently into a concentration camp where he had to work as a slave laborer in highly inhumane conditions. While in the concentration camp, Frankl made a pact with himself – they could take away his freedom, subject him to highly extreme conditions and he may even face death but he would never allow them to take away freedom of his mind. They may not give him a choice of external factors but he HAS a CHOICE of his state of mind. That choice cannot be taken away by anyone.

He ensured that he always maintained a calm state of mind and motivated himself to be happy in those extremely harsh conditions. His happiness spread across the camp and he became an inspiration not only to other inmates but also to the guards. Viktor was liberated after the Second World War in 1945. He lost his wife and parents in the concentration camp.

After his release, he wrote a book – “Man’s search for meaning” that was a huge success. He mentions in the book that even in the most absurd, painful and dehumanized situation, life has potential meaning. We as humans should exercise this choice to understand and celebrate life.

Viktor celebrated his life until he passed away in 1997 (at the age of 92 years).

Story of Nelson Mandela:

Mandela’s story is more popular and hence I’ll not go into the details. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (fondly called as Madiba), born in 1918, was a South-African anti-apartheid revolutionary, politician, activist, lawyer and philanthropist who served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999.

During the apartheid regime, he was imprisoned for 27 long years. Most of this prison time, he spent on Robben Island, in a damp concrete cell measuring 8 feet by 7 feet, with a straw mat on which to sleep. He was locked in solitary confinement on several occasions. During this imprisonment, he lost his mother, his son and was denied to even attend their funerals. He was forced to work in lime quarry under harsh conditions. Mandela, like Viktor Frankl, understood that while the apartheid regime could control his external freedom, he has the CHOICE of his state of mind. Like Frankl, Mandela was an inspiration to many of the inmates.

Post his release from the prison and election to the President of South Africa; many of the white people in the country were scared of the retaliation by the blacks. However, Mandela setup a Truth and Reconciliation committee and worked very hard to bring the white and black communities together. When he was asked if he carried any grudge against the whites for robbing away many years of his youthful life, he responded with an overwhelming No. He said his life is in his control, driven by his state of mind not based on the size of the room he lived in.

Both stories of Viktor Frankl and Nelson Mandela show us extraordinary choice that they made of mental freedom/state of mind even in extreme harsh conditions.

I do understand that life is not easy and making choices, sometimes, is very hard. We see an increasing trend of people who are depressed, commit suicides, as they are not happy with their lives (or rather the choices that they made, have not worked out the way they expected). Newspapers/Internet are abuzz with how there is an increasing level of unhappiness in people, despite an exponential increase in quality of life. Many of us are unhappy for wide variety of reasons. Our state of mind is not necessarily calm.

If there is anything we can learn from the stories of Viktor Frankl and Nelson Mandela, it is that we do have a larger choice that we can make about our life. We can make a choice that we will embrace and celebrate the life the way it is (as against the way we wish it to be). It’s a choice that we can make about ourselves, for ourselves. I am sure if we do that, life has a way of working itself out well. I think it’s the reason why the gift of choice has been given to us.

Now, are we ready to make this CHOICE?