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An eBook from Selahsomeone

ABSTRACT“Because a choice is Hard or tough, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. The greater the sacrifice, the greater the reward.”

Selahsomeonewww.selahsomeonetotalkto.com

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I HAVE NO

CHOICEBy Selahsomeone

(Abosede Omotayo)

© 2017

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CHAPTER ONE

The God Angle

”Joshua 24:15 And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom

ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of

the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my

house, we will serve the Lord.”

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Choice is one of man’s fundamental right to which God

would not influence unless man gives Him the right to.

Deuteronomy 30:19 “I call heaven and earth to witness

against you today that I have set before you, life and death,

blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your

offspring may live”. God has given you and me, the power

to choose; the right to decide which path we want to follow

and the privilege to choose the master we want to serve.

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Do you know that where you and I are today is as a result of

those choices we have made in the past? Not evil powers,

not circumstances, not the economy, not our upbringing, not

our background, not our friends but our choices. When we

make the right choices, things will go right and vice versa.

Even when people try to guide you, it is still your choice to

choose whether to listen or not. Now, you should be asking

yourself, “how can I make the right choice?”

Making the right choice requires you to make an important

choice first and that is “the choice to accept, serve and trust

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God and give your life a sense of direction”. Prov 3: 4-5

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on

your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him,

and he will make straight your paths”. If you make this

choice today, then you would be handing God the right to

guide your future choices and believe me dear, with God you

can’t go wrong.

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Chapter Two

The Little Lie

”I Don’t Have A Choice”…This is the little lie we tell ourselves each time

something happens, which could have been avoided, if we had made better

choice(s).

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Choices are different ways a particular event could have

been handled and in real life situations it is absolutely

impossible to have just one option. Choices could either be

easy or hard. What many people call “No Choice” is simply

the absence of “an Easy option”. Hard choices often require

more energy, overcoming fears, humility, faith, lots of brain

activities, controlled emotions, self-sacrifice, self-discipline

and hope. Easy choices on the other hand require less or

nothing and often times it produces nothing extra-ordinary.

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Illustration:

Two different houses were robbed some time ago, after

taking the possessions of the people in these two houses, the

robbers demanded to sleep with the wives before their

husbands, at gun point. The husband in the first house did

not put up a fight, because he felt at gun point he had no

choice, so he allowed them rape his wife and the robbers left.

However, the husband in second house, resisted the robbers

despite the guns, he was shot at and because of the screams

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and pandemonium that followed, the robbers fled without

raping his wife.

After the incident, the first house never remained the same.

The husband could not look at his wife again neither could

the wife forgive her man for allowing the robbers to have

her, they divorced after some time and the kids were shared.

In the second house, though the man now limps, his wife and

his kids love and respect him more, he became the hero of

his family and a confidant of his wife because he made the

hard choice.

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Yes it is not easy to make the hard or tough choices but then

it will always set you apart.

Many people complain about their current jobs but still they

don’t resign, telling themselves, ‘I have no choice’; many are

trapped in a bad relationship and they hang on, saying, ‘I

have no choice’; some keep doing shameful things and they

know it is shameful but they tell themselves, ‘I have no

choice’; someone insults you and you fight back, saying, ‘I

have no choice’; all my friends are bad, giving my life to

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Christ will make me look silly, see ‘I have no choice’… Dear

reader, we all have choices and because a choice is hard

doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

Heroes, Legends, Martyrs, Extra-ordinary people,

Successful entrepreneurs, World leaders, great icons have all

made the hard choices many times in their lives and if you

intend to be amongst them you have to learn to start making

some tough choices too. Everything in life requires making

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choices but for the best things of life, you need to make the

hard choices. Take the bold steps, make the right choices no

matter how difficult they might seem and life itself will

reward you.

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Chapter Three

Choice and Responsibility

In the end, we are responsible for how things turn out for us. Not the gods

neither is it the unseen spirits, not fate neither is it destiny, it is simply the

accumulation of all the choices we have made; one choice after another!

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Recently, a friend of mine lost his job because of an obvious

silly act, and when he was asked what happened his response

was, “it was the devil” (I am sure the ‘devil’ must be so

confused by now considering the number of accusations

he/she gets daily). Then I simply asked him,” did the devil

make those choices for you?”. He wouldn’t reply, he just

kept starring blank. This is exactly what most of us do, when

things go sideways, we are so comfortable at passing the

blame, while others use words like “God understands, it is

well, I can’t kill myself etc.” to cover up for their laziness

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and indecisions. Don’t get me wrong, supernatural forces are

real but 99% of consequences are as a result of bad decisions;

our own choices.

Too often we shy away from taking responsibilities for our

mistakes, bad choices and nonchalant attitudes however, we

are quick to take credit for things we got right. Life works

both ways, sometimes it is just so perfect while other times

it seems like we can’t just get anything right, unfortunately,

we have to be responsible for both outcomes. We want to ask

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questions like; why me? what kind of luck is this? who

should I blame for this? When the most important question

should have been ‘will I be able to bear the outcome of this

choice?’.

I know most often wrong choices are as a result of pressure,

pressure so powerful that our natural line of thoughts

become distorted. Such pressures include peer pressure,

greed, hunger, body desires, laziness, anger, jealousy,

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alcohol, drugs, cravings etc., but the truth is, no matter what

is responsible for the pressure, when the did is done, no one

sees the pressure and distortions again, the fact you made a

choice and you must face the consequences; even where you

don’t pay the ultimate price, the scar just never goes away.

Now I am not going to assume, we all have equal self-

control, in fact I agree it is often easier making a wrong

choice than the right one, right decisions require more

sacrifices and sincerely it takes lots of guts but we also must

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have it in our subconscious that we will be responsible for

the outcome of our actions. If it’s our action then the

responsibility cannot be passed.

“You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the

circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change

yourself. That is something you have charge of.” – Jim Rohn.

To achieve your goals in life you have to take responsible

for your actions and inactions, and you have to be disciplined

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enough to make the right choices, even when they really

don’t sit well with your immediate desires. Apologize when

your choice affects others most will forgive your sincerity,

when you give your words honour them because second

chances are very rare, own your problems and be about

solutions, and don’t feed your lazy thoughts by being

inactive, even the devil needs an idle hand before the devil

can manipulate.

It is your life and you are responsible for the outcomes, you

hold the pen to write your own story, the moment you drop

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the pen others will pick it and write whatever pleases them

for you. I don’t want that and I know neither do you. So don’t

handover the control of your life to someone or something

else, own your existence and make this one life that you have

count for something good.

You are responsible for your life, so learn to take responsibility!

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POSE

No matter who said what, it has always been your decision

You have made the choices and you are in this situation

People may have influenced your line of thought

But you could have looked back on what you have been taught

No matter how bad and demeaning the pressure is

You always had the chance to choose before it came to what it is

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Many people will come along our way

Many of whom have lost their way

If we do not exercise caution we may join the trend

Forgetting we have a say on whom we choose to call a friend

We are responsible for our lives first before we care for two

Even when we are blinded by our feelings and needs too

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Circumstances, most say led them to doom

But same circumstances had made others bloom

What we make of life is more of how we respond to life

Some challenges may seem insurmountable but that’s just life

When you go through history, you will find people have survived worse

And what you are going through is just a phase in life’s pose

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No one can take the blame for the choices you have made but you

Bad character and uncontrolled childhood excesses kills prospects like flu

We have no sufficient reasons to end up as failures

In spite of the rough starts, faith and hard work are often the best cues

There will be pressure from friends, family and life itself

But in the mist of all these pressures you will be wise to be yourself

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Chapter Four

Getting What You Deserve

Good choices don’t necessarily translate to excellence or success, sometimes we deserve the best through our choices yet we end up with little or nothing!

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There is a clear difference between what you desire and what you deserve. What you desire is what you wish to have with or without the means while what you deserve is what comes to you based on what you have invested and the choices you have made. Lots of people have concluded that life really doesn’t give people what they deserve but this is untrue what life may not give is what man desires, it surely gives man what he deserves.

Our choices to a large extent determines what we get out of life. Making the good choices and sometimes hard choice drives us closer to what we deserve, however apart from our choices, there are other factors that we must never neglect, if we truly want what we deserve.

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How Can You Get What You Deserve

1. Set your priorities right: Define what your life is about, what your purpose is and make the best of what you have.

2. Get information on where you are going: No knowledge is wasted and what won’t teach you what to do would teach you what not to do. Knowledge is the path to success.

3. Connect the right people: You are as influential as the people you know. Meet people in your field, make connections that would aide your growth and development.

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4. Never let small obstacles discourage you: Hurdles will come, there would be trying times, hardship and cruel people will try to pull you down but see them as small obstacles which are not enough to stop your dreams.

5. Know that success is not an end neither is failure the end: Success is not a point to be reached but movement from one point of achievement to another just as failure is not the end but a chance to pause and re-strategize.

6. Embrace criticisms and be weary of praises: Critics should be your best friends, they see what you wouldn’t see about yourself, don’t ignore them. Praise-singers should be ignored as much as possible so they don’t make you lose your focus.

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7. Don’t neglect the supernatural angle of life: Whatever manifests in the natural has its origin from the supernatural, don’t play God as a substitute, give Him the lead role in your life and every of your dealings.

You can get what you deserve if you really work at it and stop wishing for it, because you desire it doesn’t make it your entitlement but if you give it all you have and make choices in line with what you want, then you will have what you deserve.

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Chapter 5

Live To Be

What is your greatest desire? What do you want more than anything in this world? What gives you joy whenever you do it? What do you think your

happiness is tied to? What burns in your heart and gives you sleepless nights? Note, the question is ‘what‘ and not ‘who‘, these are questions that can lead

you to what you should live to be(come) by choice.

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Do you know making your dream come true is solely your responsibility? The choice of the kind of people you allow into your life, the kind of thoughts you entertain and the amount of efforts you are willing to exert would eventually determine how far you will go. Having desires don’t count for dreams, what counts are realizable desires backed by plan course of actions and drive to make them happen.

Because you want to be a millionaire doesn’t make being a millionaire your dream but when you say you want to make millions as a professional and you choose to pursue that profession with all you have got, then you have a dream and purpose to become a millionaire.

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Life is meant to be lived and living is to be; become something, be yourself, be purposeful, be successful, be a better you and so on. Many people live just to please others; parents, spouse, friends, colleagues etc., they have pleased people for too long they have lost the idea of who they are or who they want to be; that is not living!

Living goes beyond sleeping, eating and working. Living requires making hard and tough choices; having direction, destination, goals and purpose. We don’t just want to be another figure on the world’s population, we should be amongst those figures that truly count.

“When it is a decision about your life, you come first. You don’t have to lose your happiness because you want to make someone happy. You never should have to become small so that someone can feel comfortable around you!”

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When choosing, there are so many things we can sacrifice; money, clothes, comfort, time etc. but of all things, no one should ever have to sacrifice his/her happiness. Whatever gives us joy, happiness, satisfaction is not worth sacrificing. You don’t have to become small so that anyone can feel comfortable around you. If you have identified who you are meant to be, then only people that shares that vision with you is good enough in your life. You should not be forced to choose between your happiness and anyone or anything. You can compromise on so many things but never on your visions and happiness.

Live to be, don’t live to please, what good is life if not well lived. Be about purpose, you have not come this far to end

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up as a none-entity (nonentity). There is something about you that draws you to something new waiting to be unleashed, open your mind and follow the ray of light. No time is too late and none is too early.

Make the tough calls, choose the kind of life you want, the kind of people that you want there, surround yourself with people who want to be part of your success story, choose a life you deserve and work at it till you have what you truly want. Dreams come true my friends but only dreams that are work at.