CHOICE
- Heather Newman
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Autopilot & Awareness
Have you ever looked back on a period of your life and realised that some of the choices you made weren’t really choices at all? Not because someone forced you, but because you were simply 'going along' with what was expected. Doing what everyone else was doing. Following the path that seemed sensible, acceptable, or safe.
I think many of us move through parts of our lives on autopilot. We follow expectations, conditioning, habits, family patterns, and societal norms, often without stopping to ask ourselves what we actually want.
We become so focused on doing the “right” thing that we can forget we have a choice at all.
Maybe recognising our ability to choose comes with age, experience, self-awareness, or a strong foundation of self-worth. Perhaps it’s something we’re taught, or something we discover for ourselves. Whatever the reason, I’ve found myself, now in my mid-forties, truly appreciating the power I have to choose my own path.
I’ve been reflecting on moments in my own life where I felt stuck, only to realise later that what was really missing wasn’t opportunity, but awareness. I hadn’t recognised that there were choices available to me. That I could think differently. Act differently. Choose differently. And it got me thinking about just how much of our lives are shaped, not by our circumstances, but by the choices we make within them.
The Power of Mindset
Sometimes, in life, we genuinely cannot change what is happening around us. We cannot control other people, predict the future, or instantly change our circumstances. But even in those moments, we do still have one very powerful choice: the choice over our mindset.
What do I mean by mindset? I mean our thoughts. Our thoughts shape how we experience the world around us, but they also shape how we experience ourselves. They influence our confidence, our self-worth, our relationships, our decisions, and ultimately the direction of our lives.
Our thoughts create feelings.
Those feelings trigger behaviours.
And behaviours repeated over time become patterns.
ANTS, PETS & The Snow Path Mind
My coach, Ashlie Walker, introduced me to the idea of ANTS and PETS.
ANTS are; Automatic Negative Thoughts.
They arrive uninvited, in their thousands, and can very quickly take over, creating feelings of overwhelm. Spiralling thoughts. Fearful thoughts. Critical thoughts. Thoughts that tell us we’re failing, not enough, behind, unworthy, or unloved.
PETS are Positive Encouraging Thoughts.
These are different. We have to intentionally invite them in. They need to nurture, care, consistency, and practice. And whichever thoughts we repeatedly feed will grow stronger.
One of the most powerful things my coach, Ashlie has taught me is how much our minds love a job. If you give it something to look for, it will find it. If we constantly tell ourselves that we don’t matter, our minds will search the world around us for evidence to support that belief. Every awkward interaction, unanswered message, disappointment, or rejection suddenly becomes proof. We can begin to believe the world and everyone in it, is against us!
But the opposite is also true. If we begin reminding ourselves that we matter, that we are worthy, capable, important, loved, and enough, the mind will begin finding evidence for that too.
And this is a bit like walking through fresh snow.
The first time we walk a path, it takes effort. The snow is thick, uneven, unfamiliar. But with repetition, that same path becomes easier to walk. The snow is compressed under our steps, and a track begins to form. This is exactly how the brain works.
Our neural pathways strengthen through repetition, meaning the thoughts we practise most often literally become the easiest ones for our brain to access. And when we begin to consistently choose the harder path, something incredible starts to happen. It doesn’t stay hard forever. With repetition, it becomes easier and more familiar. A new path begins to form. The old path, the one we used to default to without even thinking, begins to soften, becoming less defined, covered again by fresh snow, and over time, if it is no longer walked, it fades until it almost feels like it was never there at all.
This is neuroplasticity in action, the brain’s ability to change and rewire itself based on what we consistently choose to think, feel, and do. This is how real change happens. Not in one big moment, but in the quiet repetition of different choices, especially when we choose the unfamiliar, the uncomfortable, and the harder path, until it becomes the new way our mind naturally moves.
The Two Wolves Within
There’s an old story about two wolves that live inside each of us. One wolf represents fear, anger, resentment, shame, negativity, and suffering.
The other represents love, compassion, hope, peace, gratitude, and courage.
A child asks, “Which wolf wins?” and the answer is simple: “The one you feed.”
We all have both. Every single one of us. We are all made up of both light and dark parts. The more we feed fear, criticism, resentment, and hopelessness, the stronger those pathways become. But the more we feed compassion, hope, gratitude, self-worth, and belief in ourselves, the stronger those become too.
Choice, Growth & Responsibility
This doesn’t mean pretending life is perfect or ignoring pain. Life can be hard. People hurt us. We hurt people. Difficult things happen. We are messy faliable humans after all. But there comes a point where we have to gently ask ourselves whether we want to build our identity around suffering, or around growth.
Sometimes we become so attached to the painful things that have happened to us that they begin to define us. We gather them as evidence for why life is against us, why things never work out, or why we cannot move forward. But what if those experiences were not there to destroy us, but to teach us? To show us where healing is needed, where boundaries are needed, where self-worth is needed, where growth is needed.
Living in victimhood can leave us feeling as though life is happening to us.
Choice allows us to begin living with life instead.
The older I get, the more I realise that choice isn’t always about changing our circumstances. Sometimes it’s about changing the way we meet them. We may not always have control over what happens to us, but we do have influence over what we think, what we believe, and what we choose to feed within ourselves.
The ANTS will always arrive uninvited.
The PETS require intention.
And perhaps that’s the real choice available to all of us. What are you feeding today?
If you'd like to check out my coach Ashlie Walker, who is actual human magic, please click the link below!
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