Pinball Wizard
Will you make choices or land in the gutter?
As a psychotherapist, the patients I have seen who are the most unhappy are often the ones who find themselves in painful circumstances and can’t quite trace how they arrived there. There’s a quiet heartbreak in that realization. In hindsight, they may recognize choices that, at the time, didn’t feel like choices at all, until one day they look around and feel lost in a life they never intended to build.
We do have choices in life, though it doesn’t always feel that way in the moment. When we don’t actively engage with those choices, life can begin to feel like something happening to us rather than something we are shaping. It’s like being a pinball shot into motion each morning, flinging from one reaction to the next, exhausted, disoriented, and unsure, bouncing off the bumpers and landing in the gutter, wondering why nothing feels steady. Repeating this daily, getting shot out of the shaft into an unintentional life, leaves us exhausted. Many people carry quiet shame about this, but it’s not a failure of character. It’s often a lack of pause, reflection, or support. A form of survival when life becomes too hard.
When we begin to make intentional choices, even small ones, something shifts. We reclaim a sense of authorship over our lives. This doesn’t require perfection or certainty, just a willingness to ask, with deep reflection, What do I need? What matters to me? From there, we can take steps, however tentative, toward a life that feels more aligned. Whether it’s choosing a partner with intention rather than happenstance, or setting boundaries that once felt impossible, these decisions build not only direction, but also a sense of dignity, confidence, and self-trust.
Of course, life rarely unfolds exactly as planned. Goals evolve, circumstances change, and sometimes we must adapt in ways we never expected. But even then, there is meaning in having tried, in having engaged, in having chosen. Without that, life can feel hollow, like time has passed without us ever really being present for it.
And then there is grief. Something no one chooses, and something that reshapes us in ways words can barely hold. Grief can feel endless, disorienting, and profoundly lonely. It leaves behind a silence where someone once lived inside you. If you’ve been there, you know how heavy even the smallest moments can feel.
Yet even in grief, there are fragile, powerful choices. Not about what happened, but about how we carry it. Choosing to get out of bed when everything in you resists. Choosing to eat, to breathe, to keep moving through a world that’s moving faster than you can comprehend. These are not small acts; they are quiet forms of courage.
I’ve been there myself. Within 30 minutes of my son’s passing, I was so angry at every transgression that I could remember, with images flashing by in nanoseconds. I quickly stopped myself, saying out loud, “This is not how I want to remember my son, not how I want to honor my son.” I changed the narrative, and although I remember all those painful things, the memories are not based in anger, and they are not what I dwell on as I continue my relationship with him, based in love.
This speaks to being human. It shows how grief can pull us in many directions at once, and how, even in that storm, we can gently guide ourselves back to what feels true. That choice doesn’t erase the pain, but it honors the bond in a way that allows it to continue, reshaped but not broken.
Even when your world is torn apart, and you feel helpless, you are not. Healing doesn’t mean filling the hole completely. It means learning how to live with it, to grow around it, and, over time, to let it hold not only pain, but also love, memory, and meaning. One choice at a time, one step at a time, you begin again. Not as the person you were, but as someone carrying both loss, resilience, and love forward.
Do you remember positive choices you made on your grief path? Let’s talk about it…
“If you don’t know where you’re going, that’s exactly where you’ll end up!” (Nowhere) - Yogi Berra, baseball player
Yes, quiet acts of courage, and when we have used all our courage for the day we pause and rest. To begin anew daily often taking baby steps. Powerful reminders, Nikki. Thank you. 🙌🏼💜
Beautifully said. What wisdom without brushing the immense feelings aside.