Witness the effects of choice upon the life of an individual.
Witness the effects of choice upon the lives of many, affected by the choice of that individual. To stand back and be an observer of this phenomenon is seemingly impossible, as the observer is an integral piece of existence, despite the desire to be removed for observational purposes. Even to just observe, an individual is making a choice, affecting countless unknown aspects of being. Therefore an observer cannot be an observer, if they cannot truly stand aside from the wonders of our not so simple, cause and effect existence.

The human life reflects this notion very prominently. Our desire to look into the future and discover what may lay ahead fills our minds with thoughts of our very existence. How choosing one path instead of another, be it a fork in the road or a fork in our life, will send us far, far away from a presumed outcome, and even farther from where the other path could have taken us; Or even closer. It is impossible to know, as when our foot falls upon the first stone of a chosen path, it sends a shock wave out to the farthest reaches of the universe. We will meet new people, people we may not have met had we chosen the other path. We will see new places, places that change even as a result of that very first step. Our very existence in this world affects the existence of every other aspect of the world around us, including individuals, groups, matter, the air we breathe, the water we drink, and even something as profound as evolution.

What if the mechanism for evolution exists within the choices we make, how we view ourselves and carry ourselves through our day-to-day lives? These choices then broadcasted across fundamental matter, informing the very molecules composing our physical bodies and matter around us, to radiate and form in a slightly different manner, changing forever the next generation of ‘being’. How is it that advances and discoveries often occur simultaneously in different places around the world, places where direct communication is not present, even avoided? One individual deciding to look between the lines, discovering something amazing, encodes this process into the matter of others.

Humans, as conscious life forms, have a tendency to contemplate “what if”.
What if I had chosen to walk this way, where the path was rocky, yet at the end it seemed as if something great was awaiting my arrival? The path I took may have been beautiful and grassy, but was my destination viable and appeasing to my path through life? Did it teach me a valuable lesson? Why did I hesitate and stop for a second before I continued down the appealing, easy path? Regret often follows these thoughts, a very destructive mechanism if one doesn’t take it to heart and transfer this experience to all the possibilities of the future. Perhaps regret is the body’s defense mechanism for ignoring one’s intuition, causing the individual to stop and think about the effect this had upon them and maybe giving the mind an opportunity to comprehend the possibility that intuition is more important than we commonly believe. This may then have the effect of causing an individual to pay more attention to now, instead of yesterday or tomorrow.

If one opens their eyes and looks at the world and the characters around them, chances are they will commonly find that those who are truly happy and at peace, not necessarily successful (in terms of money), but individuals who effect their world in a positive way, are those who know of this notion:
“I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.” Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken”

-Hayden P