The Power of Personal Choice

By Greg Fullerton

Alvin owned a bike shop. One day he heard a voice from heaven command, “Alvin, sell your bike shop.”

He ignored the voice, thinking it was a figment of his imagination. But a few days later he heard the same thing. “Alvin, sell your bike shop.”

He ignored the voice for another week. Finally, he heard the voice say, “Alvin! Sell your bike shop for $3 million.”

So Alvin sold his shop for $3 million dollars.

A few days later he heard, “Alvin, take all your money and go to Las Vegas.”

“Are you kidding me?” he asked.

“No. Take all your money and go to Las Vegas.”

By this time Alvin had learned to listen to this voice, so he drove to Las Vegas with his $3 million.

As he relaxed in a casino the voice came again, “Alvin, go to the blackjack table. Put it all on one hand.”

“What?! Are you crazy?” Alvin was incredulous.

“No. Go to the blackjack table and put it all on one hand.”

So he plopped himself in a chair at the blackjack table and dropped his entire fortune on one hand.

The dealer gave him his cards, and he flipped them over to discover he had 18.

“Wow, this is unreal,” he thought, quaking inside.

The dealer came around to him and Alvin signaled that he didn’t want more cards. That is, until he heard the voice say, “Take a card.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. I’m on 18!”

“Take a card.”

So Alvin told the dealer, “Hit me.”

Boom! He got another ace. He now had 20. “I’ll stand,” he proclaimed to the dealer.

“Take another card,” the voice commanded again.

“No way!” Alvin protested.

“TAKE ANOTHER CARD!” the voice persisted.

Reluctantly, Alvin said, “Hit me.”

Scared to death, Alvin slowly turned over the card. It was another ace, which put him at 21.

That’s when he heard the voice exclaim, “Unbelievable!”

Yeah, it’s an irreverent joke, but I think there are some legitimately valuable lessons to learn from it.

I don’t know what your beliefs in God are, and I’m not here to challenge them. What I do want you to think about, however, is how much you believe in the power of personal choice and how much responsibility you take for your choices.

Throughout my life I’ve seen too many people shrug off failures with lame excuses like “It just wasn’t meant to be.” They want to blame circumstances, the “gods,” their family upbringing — whatever — for their results in life.

I know that there are tons of things we can’t control in life. But I’m also a firm believer in choice. I know that we choose our ultimate destiny. I know that we can overcome any circumstance placed before us.

I know that we can at least control our attitude in relation to what happens to us. As Viktor Frankl, a concentration camp survivor, said,

“…everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

Interestingly, it’s typical for human beings to take credit for the good things in life, but to blame God when things go “wrong.”

How about just accepting that life is what it is and dealing with it? How about taking personal accountability for the things we can control, and accepting the rest?

If you’re going to succeed in Max or with any endeavor, it’s not going to be because of some whimsical, unseen being who gambles with your life. It’s not going to be because the stars aligned, or because you got “lucky.”

You’ll succeed when you choose to succeed.