Press pause & rewind

I used to believe it was bad to change my mind, to suddenly decide that no, I didn’t want this or that thing I longed for a year or five minutes ago anymore. Then, as I grew older, I realised it’s OK to change direction and that U-turns are allowed, no matter what anyone else says.
It takes courage to go against the flow of things, to change paths sometimes radically, but the end result is oftentimes worthwhile. Whether it’s the dish you order at a restaurant, the movie you want to watch, the person you’re with or the career you chose when you were 17, you’re allowed to decide that your first impulse may not suit you anymore, and that nothing is carved in stone till after we’re buried – unless you’ve already booked your cemetery plot, but that’s another story. They say indecision is bad, it leads to unsure futures and makes one seem fickle, weak or confused. However, if you look at it from another perspective, those same people might actually have the most creative, diverse and open minds of all, their brains constantly exploring new options; nothing is out of the question when it comes to them, the possibilities endless and that is, in my book, a quality. In addition, although at times life can be hard for one whose indecision is a daily dilemma, it can lead to great adventures, the urge to change pushing one to try different ways and journeys.
It isn’t easy figuring out what we want, and even more difficult to know it all from day 1; it takes time, trial and error, questioning and even self-doubt at moments, but it all leads to where we’re meant to arrive. Some know what they want very early on, and they’re lucky in a way, having everything mapped out, linking the dots one after the other, but not everyone is good at planning, many don’t even enjoy it! Certainly, the road may look hazy sometimes, your tires seem too worn-out to make yet another 45 or 180 degree turn, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make it, doesn’t signify others are better or that you’ve ruined your chances at happiness altogether, it just means it’ll take longer to get there, because you WILL get there. And hey, enjoy the view instead of cursing the route, for in the end, life is a roadtrip and the best ones are those you forget to take a map on. Which brings me to this: the key thing to remember is that there’s no such thing as a mistake, no wrong turn, every road we take leads somewhere; we may not reach where we’d hoped when we started, but our story only grows richer with time, with every experience we have, people we meet -or dish we eat for that matter! – and if we don’t like where we end up, there’s always a new fork in the road somewhere, waiting for us to explore it.