Life Lessons with Grandpa By Molly Lizzio, MA, LMFT
I
was in graduate school at the time and wrestling with what I felt to be one of the biggest decisions about my life. I had gone back and forth with every option and had even done my due diligence and made a pros and cons list. You know the kind of list I’m talking aboutthe ones that almost always lead down a dead-end road; because we all know most of the time the pros and cons have a way of evening themselves out. If they didn’t it wouldn’t be a tough decision, and the answer would be clear to begin with.
and knees, he becomes a zen master on me. I didn’t fully get it, but I chewed on it all week.
and we had the power to choose. Selfblame and regret sink in. We’re so hard on ourselves.
That weekend I went to a friend’s house who was also in the midsts of a major life decision. I decided to test out my grandpa advice on her “Whatever decision you make will be the right one for you” I told her, even if she made the biggest mistake ever it could still be the right path for her. As I began to explain it more and more, I totally and completely got it.
The advice was one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever received from my grandfather. It helped me not to magnify my “problems.” In the grand scheme of things, the decisions were never what actually matters. He helped me rest assured in the knowledge that I wouldn’t go wrong.
The truth was I could see myself walking down either path. At that point, I was ready to surrender and just accept whatever answer came my way. Luckily for me, I went to my grandfather’s house for lunch that week and laid everything out for him. My grandfather is known for being very direct man and tends to have concrete ideas about what he thinks is right or best. I highly doubt he’s ever shied away from letting someone know exactly what he thought. I was convinced my suffering would soon be over, one way or another, because he was about to tell me what the better option was.
I had definite opinions on what I felt my friend should do, or what I might do in her shoes rather. But in that moment, I took a step back and gave her room to feel safe in her own choice. By the way, the choice this friend made was actually against the opinion I might have given her that night. And looking back all these years later, I see how important that choice was to her life. I see how almost everything that has happened in her life, the wonderful blessings that came about all came because she followed her own choice. Had she done what I thought she should do she’d still be having a great life, just by virtue of who she is, however, she made a choice, and because it was hers alone, it was absolutely the right choice for her. She would have been ok either way.
Imagine my surprise when he didn’t give me a straight answer. I was shocked when he laid this on me: “Whatever decision you make will be the right one for you.” What now? Not only did it not accomplish my need to have a concrete answer, but it threw off the entire notion of who I thought he was. This was almost as confusing as my original quandary. I left that lunch a little frustrated and very confused. Every other issue in the world I’d always gotten this man’s two cents, and when I finally came begging on my hands
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WOUNY.COM • MAY 2016
So much about life seems so out of our control that when we do have the power to choose it can feel overwhelming and ever important to get it right. So often when something out of our control doesn’t go right we comfort ourselves by saying, “everything happens for a reason” but we rarely offer ourselves the same grace and respect when something doesn’t go right,
I’ve never forgotten this piece of advice, and it’s something I shout from the rooftops when ever possible. The words have become deeply embedded in the way I live my life, and have become an even bigger part of my therapy practice. I like to believe my clients are the experts when we work together, because it’s their lives, we’re talking about. I never want to presume that I know more about their lives, their struggles, and their journey than they do. People often come to therapy looking for answers: “Is this normal?” “What would you do?” “Did I make the right decision?” And because I associate almost everything in my life with some kind of movie or TV reference, I always think of The Wizard of Oz. Dorothy kept thinking about getting to the Emerald City, and when she finally gets there what Glinda wants to know is: what has Dorothy learned? I can’t help but believe this is how life goes. It’s not so much getting to a certain point or place, but learning lessons, meeting people, and having experiences that will end up shaping who we are when we get there.