THE POWER OF CHOICE; GOING BEYOND THE EITHER/OR PARADIGM
It is human to crave simplicity. We can’t help but want quick answers. Even better if they feel solid, concrete, absolute.
Psychologists and philosophers would say it’s the hallmark of an immature ego however, because we expect with age and experience comes increasing levels of tolerance for the inherent discomfort of ambiguity.
As such, we consider religions and governments who adhere to absolutism and demand obedience to their interpretation, dangerous.
But what about smaller, more insidious ways erroneous forced choice pairings creep in and limit our experience, and certainly our enjoyment, of life?
Binary thinking is the death of creativity and possibly even truth itself. So if you’re making decisions, and you can’t see past a “THIS OR THAT,” it’s time to pull back and ask someone outside the forest to describe the trees to you.
As writer Brandon Weber puts it:
“The rigid divisions we operate under, such as left/right or masculine/feminine or good/evil, oversimplify and reduce the wide variances of reality into tidy categories.
Truth is lost in this division.”
So how about it?
What if you gave yourself permission NOT TO HAVE TO CHOOSE JUST ONE?
Reliability OR romance?
Safety OR stimulation?
Money OR freedom?
Passion OR friendship?
For example, I saw a post recently about a topic that tends to trend every so often where women (rightfully so) praise their hardworking, loyal AF, husbands for being the kind of man who’s always there even if he’s not big on posting her on social media or partaking in commercial holidays like Valentine’s Day (this particular poster apparently couldn't even remember what he has ever bought her for Christmas). She alleges that “real, sane, mature love—the kind that pays the mortgage year after year and picks up the kids after school—is not based on infatuation”... umm…, ok. Sure.
It certainly can’t survive on infatuation alone, I’ll give you that. However, as a licensed psychotherapist with thousands of hours sitting with struggling couples, I can tell you that a fulfilling partnership will not survive without it either. Key word - FULFILLING.
And posts like that typically signal one of two things:
She’s not the sort of woman who is comfortable with or prioritizes stereotypical schemas for romance. That’s fine. We all have our preferences and they’re all valid. (That’s actually my point - you can have whatever you want.)
She’s trying to convince herself that she’s not.
I’m all for reminding yourself and others that “real, sane, mature love” is in the details, the small moments where you really need someone to come through in the clutch. And I’m all for warning people that love bombing can be a sign of shallow gestures that may not take root into deeper commitment.
At the end of the day though - YOU HAVE THE POWER TO CHOOSE MORE. You can absolutely have BOTH.
For example, say you’ve married a strong, silent type. You can praise the qualities in him or her that you enjoy AND ALSO tell them how much you appreciate the moments of romance (that they have or haven’t done yet) like planning a date, bringing home a rose, or leaving a love note on your mirror or car windshield etc.
We absolutely can, and should, grow and evolve in ourselves and our coupling.
And if you’re still dating, this is the time to talk about what you’d like for yourself and your relationship long-term. Why the fuck wouldn’t you want your partner to feel fulfilled in EVERY AREA?? Why ask them to tell the world, “At least they do ______ for me”??
And if you’re single, for the love of Pete, don’t settle. Don’t buy into the rhetoric. The honeymoon period does not have to end. It can be nourished daily. It can even be reignited if it’s down to a flickering smolder. You can both choose to be unfuckwitably dependable AND romantic.
FORCED BINARY IN BUSINESS
How about the business world? Where does the forced choice show up and limit our potentiality?
Say your client wants ____ from you, but you know that they’d get better results if you were able to provide ______. Or perhaps you need to please both the investors and your ideal consumers.
Open AI, Disney, and Paramount are all feeling into those tensions as we speak. Time will tell if they’ll find a way to go beyond the binary options into a win/win for everyone involved.
For many of my entrepreneur and executive clients, this looks like revisiting their core values, their why, and their zone of genius to make sure they haven’t settled because either a) that’s how everyone else is running their company or b) they didn’t even realize they had more options.
It could be as simple as redistributing the division of labor or moving to a schedule that allows for allocated blocks of time based on task (client meetings vs. content creation) rather than per hour that is more demanding on the brain and body and not as effective.
It could also be about branding and marketing. What if you trusted your audience to understand and enjoy more than one topic? (Mine are the kind who love dialogue surrounding life and death, love and sex, money and magic of all kinds.) Who cares if others are only talking about ONE thing?
SELF-CARE
It may sound obvious and perhaps even a little reductionistic, but seriously, what if you could enjoy the hell out of working out while not choosing to be a slave to the gym if that’s not your thing?
What if you could eat clean 80-90% of the time and still enjoy the fuck out of decadent delights every now and then?
What if you chose to live minimalistically but also indulged in over the top (to others anyway) pampering when it suits you?
IS IT SINKING IN YET?
You ALWAYS have choices. Only children, extremists, and the inexperienced believe otherwise. The rub of it however is that only YOU can decide when and how to LIBERATE YOURSELF FROM LIMITATION.
