The Good, the Bad, and the Uncomfortable
We talk about choices constantly.
Good choices. Bad choices. Right ones. Wrong ones.
We praise ourselves when we choose well. We carry quiet shame when we don’t. We judge others for choices that don’t make sense from the outside. Somewhere along the way, choice became a moral test instead of a human experience.
But real choice is rarely clean.
Often, it happens in the middle of exhaustion, grief, fear, or longing. Sometimes we choose rest when responsibility is waiting. Sometimes we choose ourselves and disappoint someone else. Sometimes we choose in ways we later regret. Sometimes we choose selfishly. And sometimes we choose simply to survive.
None of this makes us bad. It makes us human.
What matters far more than labeling choices as good or bad is understanding why they were made in the first place.
Choice is deeply tied to the nervous system. At a physiological level, autonomy signals safety. When we feel we have agency over our body, our time, our boundaries, and our decisions, the nervous system can soften. When choice is restricted, ignored, or punished, the body adapts.
Many people did not grow up feeling free to choose. Some had choices made for them. Others learned that choosing “wrong” led to shame, withdrawal, or consequences that felt unbearable. Over time, the nervous system learns to protect itself. It becomes compliant, defiant, frozen, impulsive, or hypervigilant, not because of character flaws, but because safety was at stake.
So when decision-making feels overwhelming, when you avoid choices or make them quickly and regret them later, it’s worth pausing before judging yourself. Often, what you’re seeing is not a failure of willpower, but a system that learned choice wasn’t safe.
Even when we believe we’re not choosing, we usually are.
Staying silent is a choice. Overworking is a choice. Numbing is a choice. People-pleasing is a choice. These are not careless decisions; they are strategies that once protected us. At some point, they served a purpose.
Understanding this doesn’t excuse harm or absolve responsibility, but it does shift the conversation. Instead of asking, “What’s wrong with me?” we can ask, “What was I protecting myself from?” That question opens the door to insight rather than shame.
Judgment narrows the field of possibility. When we label choices without context, we stop learning from them. We harden. We repeat patterns because we’re too busy condemning ourselves to stay curious.
Understanding expands choice. It allows us to see that a decision made in survival is different from one made with safety and support. It allows us to say, That made sense then, without insisting it must make sense forever. It reminds us that autonomy includes the ability to choose again.
Growth rarely comes from punishment. It comes from awareness.
Choice is not a test of goodness. It’s a practice of presence. We don’t become wiser by always choosing correctly. We become wiser by staying in relationship with our choices, by reflecting, repairing, and learning.
Autonomy doesn’t mean getting it right every time. It means being allowed to try, to make mistakes, to change your mind, and to evolve.
That freedom is healing.
Instead of asking whether a choice was good or bad, it can be more useful to ask whether you were resourced when you made it. Were you rested? Were you regulated? Were you supported? What were you needing in that moment?
These questions don’t absolve us of responsibility, but they do return dignity to the process of being human.
You are not defined by your worst decisions. You are not your moments of fear, avoidance, or self-protection. You are someone learning how to choose, again and again, with more awareness and autonomy than you may have had before.
And that matters.
Honoring your healing and rooting for your growth.
Anique
Founder, Sanctum & Soil
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