You Must Make the Hard Decisions Over and Over

The path behind you and the one before you

When you wake up every morning, do you consciously choose to fail at your goals? Do you wake up and say “you know what, forget those chores, the familial obligations, the quiet time to read and grow. I am going to eat pizza and sit on the couch binge-watching the latest Netflix craze”?

I know you don’t; unfortunately, sometimes that is exactly what happens to all of us.

Recently I wrote an article about the difference between knowing the path and walking the path. It forced me to think about all of the times that I have had to choose the good action over the bad/lazy/selfish action (and the times when I ended up succumbing and falling short).

There is a story from Greek Mythology that helps clarify what it means to choose your actions — The Choice of Hercules.

When Hercules was a young demi-god lad he was walking along a road one day, grasped in the struggle of a personal existential crisis. Who is he to be, what will be the meaning of his life — the dreadful thoughts we all experience as teenagers about to step into the world.

Along this path, Hercules comes to a crossroads. Waiting for him, are two women, one on each side of the road. They both wave him down.

On the left, is Kakía — on the right, Areté.

Kakía beckons Hercules down her path. She promises him a life of luxury. He is the son of a god — Zeus himself! He deserves comfort. She guarantees him a life of ease and the freedom to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants. His life will consist of an unadulterated absence of suffering and craving, for he will have whatever he desires.

One imagines the offer was tempting, even compelling. I like to think of Hercules envisioning this life of comfort and a slight smile runs across his face. He then expectantly looks to his right to hear the next offer.

Areté straightens her stance and looks him in the eyes, subtly communicating that she has no such offer. She states that her path will offer him a life of struggle and constant hard work. This path will require sacrifice from him on a never-ending basis. Life will be the antithesis of his last offer. However, she tells him that, throughout this life, the obstacles that he faces and the adversity he embraces will make him great. They will make him into the honorable man he was destined to be.

This story resonated so deeply with me that I even commissioned my own version of the story myself…Feast your eyes!

I drew this brilliant rendition of my interpretation of the story on my whiteboard opposing my desk in my office, in a location I would see it every day. It also prompted several of my team to ask what the hell it was, giving me the ability to discuss the parable.

Kakía and Areté represent human personifications of Vice and Virtue (their names being Greek for the respective trait).

We obviously know what Hercules chose; we wouldn’t know his name had he followed Kakía. Areté’s path was filled with struggle and hardships; however, the end of the path lead to greatness and honor.

Mythology is full of some crazy stories. Those things never happen in real life…right?

Here is the concept that the story does not fully capture. This story tells of one decision, one time. As if it were Test Day and young Hercules passed.

But, that is not complete; that was actually the easy decision.

When you are dealing with the choice between vice and virtue, between right and wrong, you are directly speaking with Kakía and Areté. But it is not just one choice. They come back. Like the image of a miniature devil and angel on your shoulders, you have to choose to act right, to be virtuous, multiple times a day.

Every day after he followed Areté Hercules could have stopped. At each obstacle, he could have said “You know what, I am good for hard work today, I’d like some vice for a bit.” This was truly a daily choice, a daily struggle for him, and the parable does not fully convey this part of the story — the epilogue to his chosen path.

That is our story. Every day we deal with Kakía and Areté, we fight to do the right thing, and we strive to be virtuous people. It is not some test we take at 18 and then we win at virtue and life. There is no one magic book or secret to provide you with those answers. You choose between Kakía and Areté every day.

And holy shit is it hard!

Luckily though, with all of these decisions that we have made and those options that will be presented to us in the future, we have another shot at the test.

Just because vice was your choice this time, doesn’t mean that is your path. We all stumble and have all chosen vice. Sadly, we will all choose vice again. What is really important, what really matters, is that you learn from it and use that knowledge of why Kakía this time and not Areté to drive your next decision toward virtue.

We have all made mistakes and we all struggle. At work, I tell my team that I am perfectly fine with them making mistakes — I do not become upset or disappointed with mistakes.

I then tell them what will disappoint me. If we make the same mistake again, that means that we did not learn from the past mistake; we missed an opportunity to grow.

You will make more mistakes, you will choose the wrong path on occasion. The great news is that the path is winding; fork after fork, Kakía and Areté are waiting for you. Your life, your character, is made up of all the choices you have made day after day.

Who do you want to be?

You can support me and other authors by joining the Medium community. For only $5 a month, you get unlimited access to all the stories on Medium and, if you sign up using this link, I receive a small commission at no cost to you.