Last Sunday, I brought my wife out for the weekend. We had a romantic dinner, and then enjoyed a very entertaining movie - Spiderman 3. However, please don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to discuss about that movie. (I’m a movie lover not a movie critic). What I’m going to discuss here is about something that was repeated over and over again during the movie, and was even used to close it: “We always have a choice“.

Although I found that message a bit “off-track" in an action/comedy/love movie like Spiderman 3, the message still had its own impact on me, or maybe on us. Do you realize that in life we always have a choice? I believe in fate, and since I’ve known my wife, I’ve believed in God as well. However, it doesn’t mean that we don’t have a choice eventhough everything may be pre-arranged by fate or God. Actually, our fate gives or pre-arranges many choices for us after an event. It’s our job to make a choice. Let’s take one of my stories as an example.

Last year, my ex-boss went bankrupt, and my ex-company dissolved. I was out of the job much faster than I expected. It was somehow my first job, and after less than a year in, I was out with 3 month worth of salary still being owed by my ex-boss. In addition, it wasn’t the only problem because before that a few months (when everything had been very good), my girlfriend (my wife now) and I had announced our wedding in July, and it was “just nice" when I was out of the job in May (2 months before our wedding).

It was fate. I couldn’t do anything to change it, could I? However, I knew I always had a choice, and I made mine. I chose to stay happy and focus on the future. I got my new job only a few days after leaving my ex-company. Then, I borrowed money from a close friend and family for our wedding because I had almost no saving left after 3 months working for no money. We decided to make it simple yet romantic. Therefore, the “gifts" from our friends and family was enough to cover most of the cost. Actually, later some of our friends followed our way to hold their weddings because it turned out to be cool way to get married

At the same time, I decided not to file a complaint with Minister of Manpower about my ex-boss. I chose to trust him and gave him some time to settle his debt to me as a friend. In new company, I worked even harder to have a fresh start-over and to make up for the bad experience in my very first job. As you may be able to guess already, 2 months later, my ex-boss managed to sell his company and settle his debt with me, and my new boss also decided to increase my salary 15%.

Therefore, my point in that story is a big “IF". If I had chosen to cancel our wedding due to financial problem, would I have my small family, which gives me so much strength right now? If I had chosen to bring my ex-boss to MoM, would I still have him as my friend now and would I be able to bring out the best in him? And if I had chosen to work less because of my bad experience, would my boss increase my salary?

In life, we certainly don’t have a choice of what our fate will bring to us, but we certainly have a choice of how to response to it. No matter what happens, the moment we say “I don’t have a choice", we actually make a choice of “making no choice". Though it’s a choice as well, is it the best or better choice we can make?

The above story is just one of my stories. I can’t tell you all of them in this post, but I can tell I’m a typical “unlucky guy". Since I was young, I usually encounter “unexpected events". However, fate gave me a greatest gift of making choices. Thanks to that gift, I’m always able to choose to be a better and stronger person every time I come back from a setback.

My friend, I believe you know that I’m not the only one who has the gift. We all have. If you feel that this post means something to you, I hope you remember you always have a choice. Yes, we always have a choice. No matter what our fate may bring to us, it’s just to make us choose - choose to be better or worse. What happens doesn’t matter; it’s our choice that makes a difference. Fate gave Hitler a gift, the traits of a great leader, and he chose to use it to destroy the world. Fate gave Oprah Winfrey a curse of unimaginably difficult young life, and she chose to use it to heal people’s hearts. Thus, it isn’t about right choices or wrong choices, but it’s about making the choices that make us a better person.

Submitted by: Kenny Tran (0)
Kenny Tran
http://www.kenny-tran.com