“I wish things hadn’t worked out this way.”

I hate TV. I really do. I can’t shake the belief indoctrinated in me from childhood, that TV is a brain-killing waste of time. So with some embarrassment, I confess, that on the weekend, too tired and kvetchy to function, I downloaded and rewatched an old episode of Mad Men.

It was Season 2, Episode 2. Don Draper, on order from his bosses, has to dump a client. The client rails against Don.

“I wish things hadn’t worked out this way,” Don replies, not engaging with the accusations of the client at all.

Don’s response blew my mind. Wait- when someone attacks you, you have the choice to not engage, to respond from a totally different angle?!

This may sound like a stupid, obvious epiphany, but it was really profound, for me. As I explained yesterday to David, a wise friend and mentor of mine, I was raised in a world were there were no options. Every single detail of life was dictated, and conveyed via my parents, who I was taught, were never wrong. We were raised in a grid, with no room for deviation. Even when I began to rebel, I feel like I never had the brain space to step back, explore my options and make optimal choices – everything was a reaction, like a dog throwing it’s weight against a chain that keeps it tied to a post. Even when the chain broke, I felt its imprint on my neck, and threw myself away from the post, again and again, reacting to everything around me, waiting for life to hand me situations for me respond to, not realizing I was free to get up, walk away, move in some other direction on my own volition. That I had choices beyond reaction.

“I’m realizing I have a right to explore my options,” I said to my friend, David.

“Sometimes people say they have a right to something,” he said, “as a way of puffing themselves up, because they feel insecure. I think it’s better to say that you have a responsibility to explore your options.”

A responsibility. Wow. What a delicious idea…..