The Tyranny of Choice

“You can. You just need to decide soon.”

I was in my doctor’s office getting results of tests that determined my ability to beget children at this age. The doctor was announcing (enthusiastically) that I was (astonishingly) still fine; that my farm still had eggs; that my uterus was still youthful enough for the job. If I wanted to have children, she said, I could. I just needed to decide soon.

No. No no no. No no no. I thought in alarm. That wasn’t what you were supposed to say! You were supposed to tell me that my biological clock was on the fritz. That I can’t have children!

Don’t make me decide. Don’t give me this choice. I really REALLY don’t want this choice!

***

Dating in mid-life tends to send relationships at warp speed. Soul-baring conversations become the small talk.

So, it was clear to me from the start that Wanting Children was our biggest divergence.
He wanted them.
I didn’t. Not anymore.

I wasn’t prepared, however, to have this promising relationship nipped before full-bloom. More importantly, I wasn’t prepared to be judged.
So, “I think I’ve passed that stage, physically. But who knows . . .” was all I could muster.
He saw promise in my phrasing.
In turn, I promised to see a doctor to determine my ability to beget children at this age.

Which brought me head-on with this choice I didn’t want.

***

Psychologist Barry Schwartz posits that with the copious amount of options the modern consumer has, making decisions has become paralyzingly difficult. Because it involves mind-numbing analysis and unmet expectations, deciding among 57 different variations of mattresses “ . . .no longer liberates, but debilitates. It might even be said to tyrannize.”

When it comes to big personal decisions (whether it is to stay or to leave, to pursue this or that, to beget or not to beget), I have discovered that the Tyranny of Choice is more nuanced. With personal decisions, the options in front of us usually do not elicit the exact same emotional responses as mattresses do. Rather, we usually have a strong inclination towards one. And it is these clear tendencies that produce underlying struggles.

It is no longer a question of begetting or not, but a question of Me or The Other. I don’t want children. But at the same time, I don’t want to be the cause of someone else’s unhappiness.

It becomes a question of Me or Universal Wisdom. I don’t want children. But at the same time, I see it clearly all around me — the happiness and sense of purpose that children bring, the profound changes that motherhood gifts a woman, the legacy one leaves, participation in the full human experience, not to mention the built-in set of people who are required to give a damn in old age. Who am I to question generations upon generations of collective wisdom? Who am I to squander this gift that thousands of women would give anything to have?

So when it comes to personal decisions, the tyranny is in making the choice. Because the act of choosing makes me the arbiter of who gets to be happy; it hubristically pits my rogue inclination against prevailing truths. It is taking a stand as to which version of myself I am going to be, exposing myself to prejudice, and ultimately being 100% responsible for the consequences of my decision.

***

Needless to say, I really REALLY didn’t want this choice. I wanted the doctor to talk to me about broken biological clocks and zero options. I wanted her to define my life for me. I wanted the ability to point to the test results as reason for being who I wanted to be. In short, I wanted the cowardly way out.

Instead, I was led to the fork in the road between Me or the Other. Me or the Universe.

***

If, on that day in the doctor’s office, I was handed what I wanted, I would have missed out on important discoveries. I wouldn’t have been able to show him my truth. I would have lost the chance to summon up self-reliance to face whatever outcomes this truth brought about. The relationship would have been deprived of the hard but unifying conversations that followed. And I would have missed the opportunity to discover his open and generous spirit.

If I was handed what I wanted, I would not have had the breathing room for reflection and space to calmly bid goodbye to the child and the life I did not choose.

If I was handed what I wanted, I would not have realized the profound blessing I had in having the choice I did not want.

***

There is tyranny in making the choice. But there is also liberation in creation. When we step up to proactively choose our lives, we forge something uniquely our own. Like the chisels of a sculptor, choice allows more of the pieces that don’t belong to fall away — our distinct forms emerge and our rare opus, celebrated.

 

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Original photo by James Wheeler from Pexels