How does one make up ones mind
According to Joseph Conrad, “It is not the clear-sighted who rule the world. Great achievements are accomplished in a blessed, warm mental fog.” This is something I find very reassuring as I seem to live in a warm mental fog for most of the time, particularly when it comes to making decisions. I have many big decisions to make, some of them life changing, and the hardest part is keeping one voice from being assailed by the other. I try to keep my instinct as a beacon but frankly, there are so many contradictory, Yes Buts, and, What about This, to consider, or, Maybe it’s not as bad as you Think, that it all ends up in a green pea soup. Sometimes I wish my mother was still living near me and young and involved enough to make my decisions for me. People go to palm readers, throw the I Ching and read Tarot cards because they find it hard to reach inside themselves and find a clear voice. They drive their friends mad talking about the same issues and ending up in the same places for years on end. Groundhog day is what they say to me now if I try to engage them in the age old topic of what to do. Camus said, ‘ Life is the sum of all your choices, and to me that’s very sobering. What I have to realise is that for every choice I make, I lose out on something else. It’s that not having it all which is difficult, letting things go and understanding that a kind of calm accompanies every decision, even if it is the wrong one.