Mentee: Ok.
ME: Do you think the women living in this shelter made good choices or bad choices?
Mentee: Good.
ME: Do you think the choices made by the women living in this shelter put them here?
Mentee: No.
ME: How did they get here?
Mentee: God.
ME: God?
Mentee: Yes. Sometimes God will put you in a bad place to help you. And sometimes other people cause you to be here.
ME: So the women themselves had nothing to do with it?
Mentee: No.
ME: Ok. Well let's talk about your life, your plans. What do you want for yourself?
Mentee: Five babies by five different baby daddies.
ME: Let me say this, you can have what you want. I'm not here to make you be or do anything you don’t want for yourself. What I am here to do is to teach you about the power of choice. So if "five babies by five different baby daddies" is what you want, we can make that happen. Ready?
Mentee: ......
ME: With every choice you make, there's an outcome......
That was the beginning of a conversation I had with a 15 year old girl who was living with her mother and five younger brothers and sisters at a women's shelter. I'm sharing it here to point out that My Choice is not designed to create robots. It is not my desire to tell anyone what to do with their life. Of course I have opinions, but they are just that, MY OPINIONS. What I have based My Choice on is the power of choice we each possess and bringing awareness of this power to the forefront of everyone I work with.
Of course, in the case of my mentee, there's no way would I want her to have five babies by five different baby daddies. But I knew she was testing me. I knew there were others before me that she gave hell, broke down and sent running. To her they proved that the adults in her life were full of it. She had been through a lot with little stability. There were several women in that shelter with multiple babies with multiple daddies and those were her examples. I’m not judging those women or her. We all have our own path. But what I did want for her was to learn that her life was in her hands. She had two more years of high school and would be able to leave home and carve out a place in the world for herself. With everything in me I wanted her to see she did have a say in her life, her happiness, her future. I wanted her to know she had options that required new thoughts, new information, hard work, different perspectives and an open mind. I wanted her to know she had power; power to choose something, anything. And whether she acknowledged it or not, she was making a choice everyday and at some point those choices would add up and reveal HER LIFE. I wanted her to see the power evident in every person’s life and wielded skillfully would create something intentional and beautiful to its subjects, understanding that beauty is relative to each individual.
Although there have been many people in my life tell me what I should do, how I should think and believe, life has been my best teacher. It has forced me to see. With awareness I’ve seen what I knew and what I didn’t. I’ve seen where I needed more education or information. I’ve seen my strengths and weakness, habits and tendencies. I’ve seen ME create my life. And when I was first able to say I DID THIS, it humbled me. And I harness that humility using it to continue to evolve. I do believe in a higher power, the value of family and friends, mentorship and lifelong learning and I lean heavily on them all, I’m no island.
“…divine power has given us everything we need for life…” (2 Peter 1:3 NIV Bible)
“…all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with inherent and inalienable rights; that among these, are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;” (U.S. Declaration of Independence)
These passages are just a couple writings that remind me of my power to choose. The gift of choice we each have creates an outcome and ripples to the lives of those around us. Am I the blueprint for others? No, I can only live my life. But choice power is working in all of our lives. Your life is the sum of your choices.
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