The Inspirational Quote that Pissed Me Off then Changed My Life

Sometimes good things are not always recognizable as good things.

I have been in many therapy sessions during which my therapist said something that I initially thought was mean, but that shook up my viewpoint in the best way.

For example, my grad school therapist once looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Have you ever thought you might be controlling?”

I felt like she had reached across the space between her armchair and mine and slapped me in my actual face.

When I finally closed my dropped jaw and considered what she had said, I found compassion for some lingering hurt underneath my previously unidentified need to control.

“Controlling” was a difficult word to accept when describing my emotions and behaviors.

Though I did feel very little control when I was growing up. I had not yet learned how to design boundaries (or that I even could). I had not yet developed a voice to ask for help.

So I responded by trying to control all the small things from what time I woke up in the morning to what I ate for lunch to being the one to arrange group project meet-ups.

The point is this: sometimes the messages we need to hear don’t come in pretty packages.

They are rough around the edges and direct, as if someone dropped a weighted box in your lap and said, “Here. This is for you,” and the sensation of this weight jolts you unexpectedly into a new kind of awareness.

The Quote that Pissed Me Off

There is one such quote in particular that I stumbled upon in my days of Googling “inspirational quotes” in search of some kind of spark to lift me out of my stuckness.

It goes like this: “Whatever you are not changing, you’re choosing.” - Laurie Buchanan

Okay, wow. That hurt.

I definitely did not feel like I was choosing my environment, the way certain family members behaved, or my excessive overbite. This was all completely out of my control!

And yet, waving eagerly underneath the abrupt tone of “Hey, you! Enjoy this arrow to the ego!” was a tiny messenger whose goal it was to introduce the notion that I did in fact have choices. Even if I couldn’t see them.

I was not choosing the way my father talked to me, but I was instinctively answering the phone when he called.

I was not choosing to have an overbite that rivaled the expanse of the grand canyon, but I was allowing it to impact my self esteem deeply instead of trusting the process of my orthodontia.

I was not choosing to allow misogyny to persist in my world, but I did get up and do the dishes when my grandfather said, “You’re a girl, get in there,” while motioning to the kitchen.

I made choices that I didn’t know were choices, which meant that I could also make different choices that served a life that I actually wanted to live.

Real Talk and its Impact on a Life

Once I received this gift of awareness of choice, I started making conscious choices.

I began to answer only the phone calls that I wanted to answer.

I got fun colored rubber bands for my braces to commemorate every holiday I could think of.

I clapped back at misogyny and stayed seated at the table when I wanted to, and got up to help my grandmother with dishes when I wanted to.

I will now dramatically repeat the not-so-friendly quote that allowed me to have a serious reframe, that put me in the driver’s seat of my life where I belonged all along but had unknowingly relinquished to others: “Whatever you aren’t changing, you’re choosing.”

Your Turn: Let’s Reflect

So, what are you choosing? What other small (or big!) choices can you make in order to build a life more well suited for you to live?

How can you put yourself step-by-step back into the driver’s seat of your own life?

The reality is, if we are not making active choices in our own lives, we will simply be reacting to the choices of others.

We will fall backwards into the sinking belief that we have no control over our lives.

And if you are anything like me, that sense of lack-of-control will lead you to hyper-focus on controlling the small things in avoidance of the big (meaningful) things.

If you feel choiceless or stuck, consider posting your ask in the comments and let our community of fellow feelers brainstorm some choices that they may see that maybe you can’t yet see.

In your jaunt through life from here on out, consider this: Life changing messages may piss you off.

Allow them to do so, then allow yourself the opportunity to absorb the message underneath. It might just change your life.

Yours in real talk even when it hurts,

Emily Rose // Miss Magnolia

*This still didn’t feel like a solution to the greater issue at hand, and it certainly wasn’t, but it helped me to feel I made a statement for myself.

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