Second Choice Worlds

DAILY BYTE

As we concluded yesterday, change happens. As difficult as it sometimes may be, that is a truth we simply have to learn to embrace.

I say difficult because sometimes we find ourselves in situations of change that are distinctly unwelcome. Our lives may have changed for the worse over the last couple of months.

Perhaps you didn’t get the exam results you were hoping for, or that promotion at work. Or you may have had to move to a new town, or you may be facing up to some situation of hurt or grief like an unwanted pregnancy, or the loss of a loved one. Maybe you are struggling with the thought of another year doing a soulless job, or living with a toxic relationship.

The author, Viv Thomas, has a phrase to describe situations such as these. He calls them, “Second Choice Worlds”. Everyone likes to make choices in life, and of course we all would like to choose only the best for ourselves. In the ideal world, we all would have wonderful relationships, fulfilling jobs, more than enough money, and fantastically good looks. Most of us would nominate all these things and more as our first choice situations. However, in the real world, things don’t always happen that smoothly.

Often our first choices just are not realistically available to us, or they don’t turn out in the way we hoped.

It is then we have to deal with situations of difficult change, because the reality of second choice worlds can come as rude and unwelcome intrusions. We may get frightened and stressed, or angry and bitter as a result.

Sometimes we even respond by indulging ourselves in “First Choice World” fantasies. We daydream ourselves right out of our situations and into a better reality.

The problem is that these daydreams have no real power to help us deal with the difficult situation at hand. As a young boy, my family often moved town because of the nature of my dad’s job. As I got older, I struggled to adapt to my new schools, and so used to daydream all the time about being back in my old school with all my mates. I did this to such an extent that it took me much longer than it should have to deal with the change. I made new friends more slowly because I was refusing to come to terms with my changed reality.

Of course there is nothing wrong with having the occasional daydream, but we need to remember that continually fantasising about “First Choice Worlds” that just do not exist, will never help us move beyond our pain and struggles. Unfortunately, “Second Choice Worlds”, are part of the reality of life.
Unwelcome change may have brought all sorts of trials and grief to us, but the Bible promises us that God will “refine” our faith through these difficult moments. This message builds on yesterdays, because it is a reminder that not only will God always be with us, but also that God can press divine meaning even into the most unwelcome of “Second Choice Worlds”.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Lord, sometimes life brings us into unfair and painful circumstances. We acknowledge that we can often have unhealthy methods of dealing with circumstances like that. We ask that you would teach us healthy and wise ways of dealing with our “Second Choice Worlds”. In Jesus name. Amen.

FOCUS VERSE

1 Peter 1:6-7 (NIV)

In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith - of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire - may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed.