Choices

It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.
-- Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

One of the most profound statements on life that I have read. Quite easy to read. Difficult to accept. We all seek excuses for our failures. Many a time we see an extremely talented person in a position far below what he promised early on in his/her life. And we say, cruel fate and move on. But was it really fate? If we do a post mortem on the life that has been lived, we would see that at every juncture in life, we would have taken a decision that may have seemed simple at that time yet one that was life altering. It may be something as simple as deciding to ride on a bicycle even though you know that the air pressure in the tyre is low. You are to meet a person regarding some funding for college fees. On the way the tyre gets punctured and you wheel it to the cycle shop. Time passes by and by the time you reach the person's house its late and he has left for work. You'll have to wait till evening and the seat you sought in a college of your liking is a distant memory.

Many choices both right and wrong have brought us to where we are now. These are choices we made with our lives. What about those choices that we make that involves others lives? Many people in high offices or positions of responsibility are often caught in this catch-22 situation. Two people are about to be sentenced. You can save one of them. They both are friends. Whom do you save? And how will you justify ditching the other? These are questions that no one would want to answer in a hurry. And yet Life sometimes demands that we do so in a jiffy.

Over the years I have trained myself not to worry about decisions past. But yet there are a few I wish that could be undone and gone through again....

Oh! For a life minus regrets.