Choice is the quality that defines what it is to be a creature of consciousness. This quality is most deeply and significantly present in the human being. It is our free will which separates us from inanimate matter and is also the fundamental factor, the primary unit of measurement, in determining the quality and maturity of a given life form. Existence presents itself to us in the form of duality: light/dark, free will/determinism, mind/body, spirit/matter, good/evil, etc. For thousands of years our philosophical foundation in the West has been based on the struggle between two sides of duality and determining which side is preeminent. The most important lesson to be learned through our philosophical history is that duality cannot be resolved by choosing one side over the other, nor can it be resolved through belief or reason alone. Shifting our focus to the East we can observe a wholly different way of approaching the fundamental dilemma of duality. Rather than having an oppositional view of duality, the Asian philosophies view the dual sides of nature and existence as complimentary, partners if you will, which feed and interpenetrate one another. Early on the great philosophers of the East realized that duality can only be ‘resolved’ through penetrating beneath the level of duality to the place from which both sides originate and emerge; a field of Oneness, for lack of a better term. While great progress has been made in the West, in this most fundamental dilemma of duality, it is most helpful to look to this integral method of the East in order to resolve opposition into integration and mutual understanding. The applications are limitless, as limitless as are the number of dualities themselves. But it is to choice that we direct our present attention. Choice, or free will, resides in a complimentary relationship to responsibility. An excess of either choice or responsibility will initiate our departure from essential nature. As in all dualities, it is helpful to use the image of a spectrum which has at one extreme endpoint, (absolute) choice, or free will, and at the other, responsibility, or determinism. The ideal range lies in the Middle Way between these extreme points, or rather, the integration of the great palette of ‘colors’ which reside between the two absolute endpoints. If we stray too far in the direction of responsibility, we lose focus of the importance of our rights and our individual freedoms to pursue our personal path to self-fulfillment. If we stray too far in the direction of choice and free will, we lose sight of the fact that we are all connected to varying degrees and that one of our most important tasks in life is to contribute to the value of the world around us and exercise compassion-in-action. In this state of excess we spend much of our time avoiding the consequences of our actions and behaviors and often attempt to externalize those consequences onto others in an attempt to escape them. This struggle to cultivate and maintain the Middle Way and resolve duality is one which we must engage both collectively and as individuals every moment. This struggle is so fundamental and so pervasive that it defines us more than anything else. Every life is defined by the choices that have been made. In my life, I have previously made choices which served to keep me safe from the perceived risk and danger of new social situations; to keep me safe from a seemingly assured rejection which my poorly developed self-sense was incapable of bearing. The longer we engage in making a given type of choice, the more likely it is that we will continue to make similar choices; the more difficult it becomes to insert our free will at the right time in the process. This is called habit. Breaking habits can be very difficult and the process can take a great deal of time. It is not just a matter of self-awareness and understanding where our habits originated. It is also not just a matter of sheer will power. Self-understanding must be complimented with action and behavioral re-conditioning so that we can prove the irrational nature of our fears through confronting them in reality. The more that we confront fears and the real consequences of our actions, the weaker their power over us grows. I have always protected myself from confronting my fears in reality by indulging in an intellectual over-compensation- I focused on self-understanding and learning to an excess. The exceptional nature of my intelligence made it all the more easy for me to get lost within it, like another world. The more deeply I delved, the farther away from the light of reality I was drawn. As with all blessings, they have their curses, especially when taken to extremes. Anything can become an addiction, just like the intellect and things of the intellect came to be for me. It is a great shame that addiction has such a limited ‘definition’ in general understanding, i.e. drugs, blatantly harmful habits. But an addiction is anything which we rely on for salvation which cannot ultimately satisfy. I have tried several times in the past to begin the process of behavioral re-conditioning in my life, to engage the practical stage of my healing. I believe that the greatest barrier to my success in past attempts, and the reason for previous failures, is a result of the unreasonable expectations I have always held myself to. To use an analogy, when I wished to swim, I would demand that I either dive into the deep end of the pool, or not go in at all. I believe that this was a hidden attempt to keep me safe by self-sabotage thereby ensuring that I wouldn’t have to confront any possible failure or rejection. It also ensured that there was no possibility of success. Within the past year I have finally begun to gain some space from the unhealthy elements of my personality. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say I have finally made progress in developing and re-integrating that part of my self, the emotional self, which has been lying dormant and stagnant for so long. My certainty regarding this healing or progress has to do with a sense of openness that I feel deep down which I believe accompanies all true growth and development, perhaps emergence. It is a feeling which goes beyond emotion and beyond reason, though does not exist wholly separate from them. Once one feels it, there is a knowing, deep in the spirit, blood and bones that one is more ‘whole’ than before, that one has begun the movement to a new level of being. This process of growth and development is not wholly linear and could indeed involve a good deal of back-sliding, but there is a structured path and points that one reaches, levels, like ratchet points, where one has a new and higher ground from which to observe and act in the world and exist in a larger realm of possibility. In an effort to compensate for the lack of practical engagement in my ‘path to wholeness’, I have committed to a plan of progressive social involvement. I intend to maintain my attention on taking things slowly and patiently so as not to re-initiate and give power to my tendency to sabotage myself with the expectation of perfection. I have discovered several events that occur with regularity in my area which in addition to having value in social conditioning, also engage my interests and aptitudes thereby contributing to several areas of my self-development. As long as I maintain a steady pace and a trained awareness and focused attention on my mind and environment, I believe that I will progressively build momentum which will make it more natural for me to act in the world. I don’t regret what has come before, even the worst of it. The truth is that all of life is a process of alchemy, and our minds are the transformative elements. Through perspective and the application of the full range of rational and spiritual faculty, we are given to transform the raw material of experience that we are given into the food and fuel for cultivation and growth. Through suffering, we attain empathy; through pain, compassion; through fear, courage and fortitude. Everything that has come before is prelude to who we are. And who we are is Beautiful.