Today’s sermon wasn’t as killer as some of the other ones have been, but it contained a very nice and important reminder.

When we choose to take “the road less travelled” (or even the one more travelled, for that matter) it not a single choice which then dictates how our life will go.  It is one choice, just one, in an endless (until we die) series of choices that decide the shape and substance of our lives.

This point I think is at the heart of the idea of conscious living.  When we live consciously, every step we take is a choice considered and made.  Most of our choices are not considered.  We simply take the same path we see other people take, or the same path we’ve taken before in this situation, or the path that seems immediately expedient.  But we don’t THINK about this.  We don’t say, “I think I will do this, even though I COULD do this, that, or the other, because I’ve always done it this way before and it has worked well for me.”  We just do it, almost as a spinal cord mediated reflex rather than anything our brains actually touch.

It is so difficult to live consciously when one has spent one’s entire life practicing living in a less-than-conscious, fairly reactive, state.  So this week I’m going to make a concerted effort to consider every thing I do as a choice made and acted on.  I’ll probably make notes on this in posts or tweets throughout the week.