Inspirational Quotes & Stories about Choices

Whenever you can, try to replace anxiety with peace, anger with love, judgmental behavior with understanding. Replacing illusions with truth will assist you in awakening and remembering truth. Approach every situation possible by extending the truth, the love that you are. Make your peace of mind and joy the goal in every situation possible. This is achieved by reacting to a brother or sister with forgiveness, love, peace and understanding, regardless of the illusion he or she might be buying into at that time. When they try to pull you into their illusions, remember that you are awake. Don't judge your brother or sister, for he or she is simply asleep and dreaming. Would you judge your child for screaming in his or her sleep, or would you hold and comfort him or her? Would you scold your child for kicking you while asleep, or would you simply turn him around? Would you laugh at your child if he described the monsters in his dream, or would you turn the light on and let him see for himself that there are no such things? Do this, and every time you succeed in remaining awake, congratulate yourself, for you have chosen peace. It is the same situation as before, but instead of buying into the illusion, you have now consciously chosen to see and feel the truth. Look back at how you reacted before, when you were asleep, when you saw the gift as a brick you must defend against, and try to remember what this behavior resulted in: pain, sadness, judgment and regret. Now, experience how it feels to be awake, to react with love, to have true peace of mind, thanks to the recognition and understanding that your brother or sister simply sleeps.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 23-24

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^"Going to a junkyard is a sobering experience. There you can see the ultimate destination of almost everything we desired." ¹

- Roger Von Oech, A Wack on the Side of the Head

Cited in You Have Chosen to Remember, p. 44
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Life is patient and kind. You will offer yourself as many opportunities as you can handle to learn your life lessons. If you choose not to learn the lessons, you will be given more opportunities. Yet each time you decide not to learn your lesson, the circumstances surrounding such opportunities will become more pronounced. This you do for your own good. This you do in order to listen and pay attention. Ultimately, you will pay attention and you will learn your lesson; it is simply up to you to decide how and when. It is up to you to decide when to start listening to what's going on in your life. The longer you decide not to listen, the louder you will turn up the volume. You can choose to pay attention and listen before or after your ears start to hurt. It is your choice. You control the volume, and you control your attention and the station. Your Godself will turn up the volume until you choose to listen. You have turned to the station you want to hear. Once you hear what it is you are trying to tell yourself, and learn what you are trying to teach yourself, you no longer need to increase the volume or repeat the lesson.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 64

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You honor your brother and sister by acknowledging that the choices they make within the illusion will assist them in their removal from the illusion. Trust this one thought, and respond with unconditional and uncompromising love toward your brother and sister. Know full well that these choices are bringing them out of their illusions. Belief in this one thought will save you years of judgment, resentment and pain.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 73

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This simple invitation will give you back the power and understanding that it is up to you to choose how you see your brother in any moment of your life. You will remember that if truly desire, you can choose forgiveness, peace of mind and joy in any instant, in any situation, and with any brother and sister. You will remember that God is always with you, and that you need only to call upon Him. Call upon that part of Him that is in you to set you free. God's present to you is your brother, and your brother's present to you is the opportunity to choose peace in any moment. Your present to God is seeing and remembering that perfection in His creation.

Throughout your life, you have tried it your way. Allow yourself, if only for an instant in time, the opportunity to try it His way. Your way has offered you suffering, judgment, sleepless nights, stress, resentment and pain. His way promises you peace of mind and joy. Your way has been taught to you through the ego. It is an illusion of who you think you are and how you think you should act and react. It is a false way, a dead end road, a lie you have chosen to believe as true.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 159-160

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"Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again, so where you made a faulty choice before, you can now make a better one, and thus escape all the pain that your previous choices brought to you."

- A Course in Miracles

Cited in You Have Chosen to Remember, p. 174
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You, at a higher level of consciousness before being born or during your life, chose such events and circumstances. They are in actuality, not disabilities or accidents but gifts. Pure and simple, they are gifts you have offered yourself in order to grow through lessons that can best be learned through such experiences. So next time you see a person in a wheelchair or an individual or child with a "birth defect," do not feel sorry for them but understand that these are courageous individuals who have chosen their path, just as you have chosen yours. Some have chosen to walk, others have not; some have chosen two arms, others have chosen one. We all have our individual lessons to learn, and we all individually understand ourselves well enough to know which specific circumstances and experiences are most useful to our personal growth.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 197

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You give your external environment all the meaning that it has for you. The assessment you place on the external environment is totally up to you. If you give it a positive definition, it is because you believe it is positive. If you give it a negative definition, it is because you believe it is negative. If you give it a stressful definition, it is because you believe it is stressful. If you react angrily, it is because you believe that the external environment deserves an angry response. Your reaction to the external environment is a reflection of the parameters you have consciously or unconsciously set up within your mind. The attitude you display toward your external environment is a verbal and mental manifestation of these parameters. Since you can consciously shift these parameters within your mind, you therefore have the final say of what attitude you will take to any and every situation.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 208

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You can grow through pain or joy, that choice is yours to make. But only the insane would prefer to learn through pain, rather than through joy. Yet, even in insane behavior, there is hope. For the more time you spend in insanity, the less you will want to remain there. As you would not want to remain in a pool for an extended period of time because it is not your natural environment, neither would you want to remain in insanity. Growth through pain and struggle is insane, yet it is only because of your choice to grow through pain and struggle that you will recognize and realize this insanity. It is because of this that even insane behavior is a great gift you offer yourself. Thus, my friend, grow through pain and struggle if you still wish to, but understand that in doing so, you are coming closer to the realization that this is not how you want to grow. It is because of this that your perceived pain and struggle are great gifts and happen for your own good.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 224

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You create and manifest both in the conscious and unconscious state. Most of us have already created and experienced conscious manifestations. Choosing to lose 10 pounds and achieving it, or getting a college degree are two examples of conscious manifestations. If something did not exist in your life, and you made a conscious decision to achieve it or not achieve it - this is an example of a conscious manifestation. It might take you a moment, hour, day, month, year or more to create, manifest and experience your current situation, yet the choice to bring this to you was yours. The value in a conscious manifestation lies not in what you can manifest, but in the knowledge that you can manifest whatever it is you choose. Having physical proof, the knowledge that you have the power to manifest your reality allows you to begin opening your mind to the possibility that your physical experience is created, manifested and experienced by you.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 230

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You have the free will to either bless every step of your journey or to be annoyed and frustrated by them. The physical manifestation and expression of your mind allows you to see where you are in your development. If you have a peaceful mind, you will create peaceful experiences. Peaceful experiences are more often than not, a result of having a peaceful mind. If you have a chaotic mind, you will create chaotic experiences. Chaotic experiences are more often than not, a result of having a chaotic mind. When you bless each step, you acknowledge it as a useful part of your journey and in turn you receive peace. When you are annoyed and frustrated by a step, you create tension and anxiety which leads to stress.

- James Blanchard Cisneros, You Have Chosen to Remember: A Journey From Perception to Knowledge, Peace of Mind and Joy, p. 237-238

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"When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a manner that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice."

- Indian Proverb

Cited in You Have Chosen to Remember, p. 252
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Footnotes / Acknowledgments

Every effort has been made to provide accurate source attribution. Should any attribution be found to be incorrect, the author welcomes written documentation supporting correction for subsequent printings. For material not in the public domain, selection was made according to generally accepted fair-use standards and practices.

1. Roger Von Oech, A Whack on the Side of the Head, Copyright 1998 (Warner Books).   >> back to quote
 

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