easy choices, hard life; hard choices, easy life
Have you ever heard of the poem, ‘The Road Less Travelled’, by Robert Frost?
Maybe you have, maybe you haven’t- but in case you haven’t, here it is:
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
..What a beauty.
While there’s several interpretations that have been studied in regards to this lovely work of poetry (we love this in-depth poem guide, if you want to check it out!), we’re going to lean into its impressing the importance of decision-making, and focus on the idea that it’s by practicing making decisions, especially hard ones, that hones you creatively, and even personally, too.
I think it’s safe to say that we all come to a point in our creative lives where we realize that, well, no one has the answers (expect you). Whether you’ve been hammering away at honing your craft for years (that feels like decades), or maybe it’s been less time (that still, somehow, feels like decades).. It becomes inevitable that you are met with a big, often ominous, question-mark when it comes to what you’re “supposed” to do to have success finally meet your efforts. You can have the best teachers, mentors, friends, advisors, and cheerleaders running in your pack, offering you their best wise words to help you get the answers you need..
But the truth is, at the end of the day,
the only one who knows what’s truly right for you, what’s BEST for you- is you.
..and even more importantly..
..what we often need the most, what we KNOW we need most.. is usually the harder thing.
So many of us know what it feels like to be facing challenges in life, be them creative, personal, or professional. It’s when those challenges meet us with a decision-time, that we all too often run towards the ‘easier’ choice, regardless if easy feels right for us or not. Whether at the hands of our trusted confidants, or ourselves entirely, it’s so easy to take that ‘easier’ choice in the moment, rather than the harder one. The one that makes us uncomfortable. The one that pushes us.
But..
Does picking the easy way lead to an easy life?
Or..
Does picking the easy way actually lead to a harder life?
🥵 ✨ 🥵
In light of stripping back this idea to its bare bones, we turn to this week’s blog post title. Now, there have been many varying iterations on the concept, but as it announces, we’re going on the idea that when we make easy choices, they often lead to a harder life in the long term; alternatively, when we make hard choices, they ultimately lead us down the path towards an easier life.
It can seem paradoxical, but hear me out! Whether you’re exploring yourself creatively through writing a song or learning your lines for an audition, or you’re trying to practice the art of self-discipline with a training schedule so that you may FINALLY run that marathon..
Did that song turn out how you had heard it in your mind when you took the easy choice to wrap it up quickly?
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Did you get all of your lines thoroughly off-book when you took the easy path and rushed learning them?
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Did your next run get easier or harder when you skipped that last workout, or shaved off a few minutes of pushing yourself here and there in your training?
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Ultimately, ask yourself:
How much closer are you to what you’re trying to achieve by taking the easier path?
This week, we humbly offer you this:
Challenge yourself to make the harder choice.
Try putting yourself first, turning to you instead of all those around you, and in the face of the challenges you come up against this week, listen to that little voice inside of you. That voice that truly knows you, and is championing you to make that harder, but almost certainly more-fruitful-in-the-long-term choice.
Empower yourself to practice it, and just see how it feels.
Try taking the road less travelled by.
You just might find that it’s through the harder choices, we find the ease we’re looking for.
