LIFE IS A CHOICE, OR DOES THE BRICK FALL ON YOUR HEAD BY CHANCE...

Well, let's start small. Who of you remembers hitting their pinky toe on something very hard and feeling a piercing pain that makes you want to scream, and uncontrollably hopping on one foot, writhing in pain?! I think everyone can vividly recall such an episode. At that moment, Shamans and their followers say, we are given the opportunity to choose our response to pain.

Sometimes, the moment of pain shock lasts just a fraction of a second before the profanity pours out of us, while we wriggle in pain, jump around, and try to grab our toe to alleviate the pain as quickly as possible. But that fraction of a millisecond of pain shock is given to us to make a choice.

What if, in that fraction of a millisecond, we suddenly realize that hitting our pinky toe was a warning for us that we are not living in the present, but rather spending our time in illusions of the past or future? Then we can mentally apologize to our toe and thank our Higher Self for this sign, and start reshaping ourselves to the present, here and now. I understand that this may sound silly to a pragmatic reader, but one can think that hitting a pinky toe is much better than breaking an arm, hitting your face on the asphalt, or, God forbid, getting into a car accident...

When something happens to us, we choose our response or reaction to it. This is the choice that turns into our actions and determines the color of our perception of the world, in other words, our response to life. If we choose tears and self-pity, then that's where we are headed; we react to the blows of fate from the position of a victim who expects nothing good from life and accepts the blows of fate meekly.

If we choose to learn a lesson, then, enduring the shock, we look life in the eye with curiosity and await new lessons to move forward on the path of spiritual growth.

We can also choose the path of struggle and fight windmills to the end with perseverance and stubbornness, trying to do everything not in a flow of harmony... but rather against the flow...

Following the shamanic interpretation, we create a circle of resources for self-expression (all shamanic teachings take the form of a circle or sphere, which has no end and no beginning, symbolizing infinity), in which we ourselves, life, and other people are the targets. We shoot arrows determined by our attitude and approach to solving essential and non-essential problems in life. Our self consists of "that who will not see," that is, our lower self (Shideh), and "that who learns to see," our higher self (Hokkshideh). And it is up to us which one of them will release the arrow? (in a metaphorical sense, of course).

The archer within us is gradually formed as we grow up and create our own view of the world, defined and molded by the people around us, the social environment, the public system, and the level of spiritual growth. Simply put, this means that the circle of our resources is as full and accessible as our current life experience and level of self-development allow.

The archer's arsenal contains three sets of seven arrows each: seven dark arrows, colored with pain and reaction to the surrounding world; seven light arrows, colored with joy and responsibility; and seven rainbow arrows, colored with the gift of transformation and beauty. The last seven arrows are magical; they are given as a gift only to those who make life choices from the perspective of "that who learns to see," our higher self (Hokkshideh) and are truly of service to humanity.

The seven dark arrows are our painful attachments, dependencies, judgments, comparisons, expectations, reactions to life from the position of a needy child, and, finally, our painful ego and its artificial importance. When we shoot these arrows into the world, they bring us disappointments, illusions, and the pursuit of happiness and success in the external world. This leads to a separation from other people through the inner whisper of the inflated ego.

The seven light arrows are objective self-assessment based on an introspective look inside oneself to discover true virtues, self-acceptance, self-love, and self-actualization in its inner manifestation, leading to one's impeccable morality that serves our benefit because we understand that we one with the world around us and therefore incapable of causing harm, possessing the mindset of a Warrior of Light.

Therefore, life is a choice that depends on us. Whether we choose dark arrows, determined by someone else or in a state of imbalance between our painful patterns, or whether we choose light arrows, being in the center of our own life circle and in harmony with all other forms of life, is entirely up to us.

But remember that by choosing the light arrows, we automatically destroy the dark arrows in our quiver, and we may receive as a gift from the Universe several magical rainbow arrows that will help us transform into a Warrior of Light who carries only the light of pure love to the world.