I discovered something recently. And by ‘discovered’ I mean discovered it as a truth for myself, not discovered as in ‘no one knew about this before I cunningly and world changingly happened upon it’.

I was on the beach, mooching, smelling the salt, listening to the waves, crunching on the stones, in between a visit to the library and returning home. I’d been in a pretty scratchy mood all day, after waking up from bad dreams and the persistent poking at me of certain unwanted thoughts.

I was also listening to Marianne Williamson’s Letting Go and Becoming, which is about four hours of talks she gives on lessons from A Course in Miracles. I know chunks of them off by heart at this point, but still find that each time I listen I see something anew. I highly recommend.

And I was thinking that because of the retreat I’m taking, with these wide spaces of time before me each day, things that might normally pass me by, or that seem very very tiny and subtle, start to become larger, more visible and more tangible.

For example; in the pause between deciding to leave the beach and the actual doing of it, I found that there’s a space. It’s the infinite space of the universe, for want of a better way to put it, and it’s there all the time. But I think most of us aren’t usually aware of it. I frequently forget. Depending on mood, that space can seem alive with possibility or effing scary and overwhelming.

So there I was, about to turn around and crunch home, and I saw the space, or felt it, and I realised that by making the most infinitesimal adjustment I could change everything. Not that that would necessarily happen, but I saw how a tiny choice can mean the difference between the tension of a held breath and the relaxation of a big sigh.

Something that seems limited can become something infinitely expansive; something that feels pinched can become loose and soft; something that feels irritating can be seen with a different perspective. It just takes one tiny choice. Knowing that is a comfort in itself; in our less joyful moods it’s going to have to be tiny or the effort will be more than we can give in that moment.

I made a tiny choice, in that moment before turning; I just decided I wasn’t quite ready to leave yet. My body turned, and then it turned all the way round so I was back facing the sea. See what I mean? Tiny. And in the minutes following that moment the sun peeped out for about three seconds, I found a piece of sea glass, and I remembered how amazing a deep breath feels. Some of the discomfort of the bad mood remained, but I was also reminded that there are other possibilities.

There are ALWAYS other possibilities. We forget because we can’t always think of them. Of course we can’t. They don’t live in our heads. Brains are amazing but they are so limited when it comes to possibility. For the full 360 I am learning that the only way is to allow. Take a pause, create a space, and allow the possibilities to arise within it. It’s actually a lot less work than thinking up solutions, which by its inherent limitation can end up just adding to the feeling of constriction.

The more I practice making tiny choices in my day to day life, the more time I spend in flow, in the infinite space where all things are possible and flow toward and through me unceasingly.

Examples of tiny choices I have made or might make {because I don’t know about you but I always need examples}:

~ To look beyond the visual, beyond what my eyes tell me; my library books are gifts of fascination and learning, the grey sky is an opportunity to do indoor chores before the sun comes out again and I want to be outside, bashing my head on the kitchen cupboard is a reminder to slow down. 🙂

~ Catching sight of myself in a mirror, I make the tiny choice to smile; even if it’s fake that tends to make me smile for real because it looks so weird. If I only see flaws, I make a tiny choice to see one thing I like too.

~ A tiny choice could mean three more blissed out minutes wave watching, soaking up a painting you love, reading to the end of the chapter before the next thing, counting how many things you can see that please your eye while you wait for someone.

All it is really is mindfulness I guess. A way to bring your attention to the present moment, so that you are directly experiencing your life, not just having thoughts about it all day long. Each tiny choice brings you back to now as well as being a simple way to open it up to its full expression, every moment.

I’ve realised also, since putting these thoughts into words, that actually life IS a series of tiny choices. Each moment offers a choice, whether we make it consciously or not. And the more we make them consciously, the more we create a life that reflects our deepest desires and values.

When we do not choose, we live by default. ~ Iyanla Vanzant