do we always have a choice?

when i was in primary school, usually after the year end final exams, there would be a period of time when we would not have lessons and we would be free to bring our toys, games or whatever entertainment to class and have some fun together.

besides the regular board games, dolls and uno cards, some of my friends brought books. teachers might have been a bit surprised, but these are not books for literary development. these are what we called "game books".

such books begin by a very short story line. in fact, that very first story line will lead you to scenario whereby you have to make a choice. whatever choice you make will take you to different pages. that means you do not read the book by the page sequence. and whatever choice you make each time, can lead you to very different endings. for example, say your story starts in a forest whereby you are walking down a path. along the way, you found a treasure box. if you choose to open the box, go to page 2. if you choose to ignore the box and continue your way down the path, go to page 5. whether you go to page 2 or 5, it will lead you to a point whereby you have to make a choice to go to page x or page y. and this goes on until your story ends. you get the idea.

ironically, this is one of the most important lesson i learn about life in school. we are all put into that very first story line when we start to be able to consciously make decisions. except for that very first story line and whatever life hands you, we always have choices. the only problem is whether the choice is an easy or difficult one.

the uncertainty of the outcome behind each choice is proportional to the difficulty of making the decision. and life is full of uncertainties. also, picking one option out of the rest might mean giving up other alternatives (opportunities?) available. therefore whatever life hands us, we should try to pick the choice that seems best at that point in time, and one that will not metamorphose to regret. and even though it might be difficult sometimes, the last thing we should do is to go into self-denial, say that we have no choice, and give up.

oh well, writing it down is much easier than doing it. how many times have i said that i have "no choice but to ... ..."? anyways to reverse the solemnity of this post, below is the picture of one difficult choice i had to make: