Choose Your Attitude

“The last of the human freedoms is to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances.” Victor Frankl

We go through many things in life; the good, bad, unfair, absurd, fantastic, miraculous, etc. Victor is right, we have a choice in our responses to what life throws at us.

Speaking of things thrown at us. Nine years ago I stopped on the side of a highway to try and help at an accident site. Instead a truck that lost control in the rain hit me as I was standing there. I was knocked out of my tied shoes and my body took the guardrail with me as I flew into a ditch. When I regained consciousness I realized I could not get up. A long story short, I broke a hip and a foot and was pretty banged up. Since the breaks were on different sides of my body, I could not bear weight and was thus bed-bound.

As I was recovering I would hear comments like, “no good deed goes unpunished”. I don’t agree at all. Many asked how I could be in such good spirits considering what I was going through. I told them, “You don’t understand, I’m alive and shouldn’t have survived being hit like that”. Go figure, living put me in good spirits☺. I chose an attitude of gratitude.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I’ve always chosen the best responses, but I try to be very aware of my attitude. It makes all the difference in how I feel about life circumstances.

Nyla