Chocolate or Vanilla?

I recently had a discussion with someone and he commented that he was hung up on the idea that he was finding himself doing something that he had previously judged to be wrong; that he had decided a long time ago, that “if this ever happened to me, I would not tolerate it”.  He had decided that if he ever attracted a situation like that and found himself smack-dab in the middle of it, he already knew what his response would be.  Now, years later, he is finding himself in a situation where he is doing the exact opposite of what he said he would do years ago if he ever found himself in this position; and he is bothered by that.  He is making it mean that he is “going back on his word”, that he doesn’t have any morals, that he is weak; that somehow, there’s something wrong and he needs to be judgmental about his current choice because he said he would never do what he is currently doing.  But don’t you find that it’s those things that you judge, that you then later end up being in a similar situation, and because you are, you gain a whole new perspective from which to view this from?  It’s like judging people because they don’t pay their bills on time, or don’t pay their credit card bills in full; until you’re in that position yourself, you can’t fully understand the concept.  Or saying you would never stay if your partner was unfaithful; you never know until you have an experience yourself what your new decision or perspective might be.  There are always circumstances and choices and things to consider that are personal to you when you’re in the position that you once judged as “wrong” or final.  And because you change your mind about something you once said you would “never do” doesn’t mean you have to let that mean anything bad or wrong about your character.  So I said to this person… “what type of ice cream do you like”?  He replied, “Vanilla”.  And so I said, “Well, what if you changed your mind and decided that you liked chocolate tomorrow, would you make that wrong?  Would you judge your character and decide that you need to beat yourself up a little because yesterday, you loved vanilla and said you would never eat chocolate”?  And he laughed at the ridiculousness of my question and replied, “No, of course not”.  And I said, “This isn’t any different than chocolate vs. vanilla.  You just changed your mind.  It’s no bigger than that”.  It was the meaning that he was attaching about himself because of his decision that was causing him angst.  He was making it mean a lot more than he really needed to, and once he saw that, he was able to let it go.  And so, the moral of the story is, let yourself change your mind about things.  Let life evolve and let yourself make new discoveries and new decisions based on the life you’re experiencing and let it be as simple as deciding you like chocolate now instead of vanilla.  It really is no bigger than that.