Picking the Best, Consistently

 

You’ve been waiting for your salary, and when it finally comes out you sum up all the things you need to pay for.  Then you realize that you don’t have enough money for everything on your list.  So which expense do you prioritize? Now we have different ways of figuring this out – after all, we have different values - but in the end we all make what we each would consider to be the best choice.

 

Then an unexpected windfall arrives. Suddenly awash with cash, many of us are no longer as picky with the way we spend our surplus funds. We spend this time for trivial, low priority stuff.

 

The same thing happens with time. When we have little time to do something, we pick the most important tasks. But when we have more than enough time in our hands, we do the a lot of stuff that have little value.

 

They say that a crisis brings out the best in people. Why do we have to wait for a crisis to give our best? Why can’t we behave and perform in the best way possible all the time? In our choices with time, money, and everything else, why can’t we always, consistently, choose the best?

 

I suspect part of the reason is because we run out of the will power to make the best choice. Will power seems to be affected by many factors. Physical energy and emotional condition are two factors. Clarity of vision is another; if we have a clear idea of what we want to achieve, it’s easier to make the best choice in any situation. Spirituality is a huge, perhaps the ultimate factor – the more connected you are to your God, the better your discernment of the best thing to do.

 

But to me the most obvious reason why we do not always pick the best choice is that it often involves doing things that are hard and painful. The best choice often requires us to sacrifice comforts and pleasures that we not easy to give up. That’s why when circumstances force us, we choose to do what’s right. But when we do not have to do it that way, we choose to do what is easy.

 

There are three things that we need to work on, if we want to make the best choice consistently, all the time. First is discernment, the capability to determine and know the best choice. Second is passion, the desire to do what is right and best. Third is endurance, the strength to persevere in implementing the best choice.