Why your ‘wrong’ choices are actually your best ones
We just made a choice I said I would never make and I have no idea if it’s right
This is for everyone who wonders: ‘If I do this, am I making the right choice?’
I am you, you are me.
We recently decided to quit vanlife way too soon and move back to our homecountry (something I said I would never do). And the thing that’s stuck in my head on repeat:
Are we making the right choice?
I didn’t want to make the responsible choice this time. Heck, I immediately said ‘no way we’re doing that’ but here we are: making the responsible choice to move back to the Netherlands.
Are we making the right choice?
I. don’t. know.
You actually never know if it’s the right choice.
Because this is a very unpopular opinion in the overthinking realm: you will never figure out if it’s the right choice beforehand. Overthinking it will never give you the answer. You will only find out afterwards.
In modern day it seems as we have to know the result of our choices even before we make them. Because ‘omg what if it goes wrong and I made a mistake??’ 😱
Mistakes are the enemy for women like us, perfectionists, people-pleasers, overthinkers. I would’ve done anything - anything - to avoid a mistake. Even not making a choice at all if I wasn’t sure if the outcome would be successful.
We’re just not allowed mistakes in this “should” life. I hate that!!
Because based on the ‘wrong’ decisions I made the last 4 years and the things that it brought me, I strongly urge you to start making them too.
My wrong choices, my mistakes are the best thing that happened to me.
Now listen my dear friend, you need to understand this first: a mistake in my eyes is a mis-take.
You know a take when they shoot a movie? If I think about a mistake I immediately see the clap-thing from a movie set, you know this thing → 🎬 Used to signal another take. Very often they say “take 12” which means there were 11 mis-takes before that. Does the movie fail because of that? Don’t think so.
A mis-take is just a take that was a mis, that did not make the cut and has to be done again.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the way to perfection, the world forgot about the meaning of mistakes. Now, they are terrible, to be avoided at all times, a cloud of shame washing over you when you make them. How could you sink so low as to make a mistake??
We forget, they’re just mis-takes. Just clap the thing in your head and try it again, okay?
If I look at my life right now, I can make a list of the so-called mis-takes (a.k.a. ‘wrong’ choices) I made:
Broke up with my boyfriend who turned out to be the love of my life.
Bought a 37 yo van that broke down after 3,5 months on the road.
Quit my academic job to start a business without business experience.
Gave up our vanlife to move back to our homecountry and settle before feeling ready and not even wanting to settle there but rather in a foreign country??? ← will this be a wrong choice? I. don’t. know. And I will never know if I don’t give it a shot (movie-pun intended!).
As you can see, the list is not so long. I really tried hard to think about wrong choices I made in my life. But couldn’t really name more.
Is that because I am a magical right choices-makes? No. No one is.
Is it because a lot of ‘wrong’ choices may have looked wrong to others but didn’t feel like that to me because I enjoyed the process of these mis-takes and learned so much from it? Yes.
Even these first 3 mis-takes I wrote down just to have something to write down 😅 I know that people around me will say those were my ‘wrong’ choices, my mis-takes. But I really really don’t think they are wrong choices at all. They were definitely the right ones.
Your right or wrong choices will be yours, you decide if it was right or wrong. So don’t let yourself be influenced by others because they think it’s a wrong choice. Decide yourself.
We did.
So-called ‘wrong’ choice #1: My boyfriend and I wanted to go explore the world in a van. Work remotely, convert the entire van ourselves, travel to the mountains.
When we decided we were going to do this we researched vanlife. What to do and most important what not to do when buying a van (which is the first step in the van conversion process).
What not to do:
Buy a van with rust
Buy a van that has been standing still for years
Buy a van that’s older than 15 years
Buy a van on the first visit
What did we do?
We bought a 37 year old van that had been standing still in someones garden for 5 years, with a rusty bottom, on the first visit.
Was it the wrong choice?
HELL NO.
This yellow wonder was the best thing that could have happened to us.
Did everyone around us think we were making a huge mistake? Definitely. They said we would have engine issues, which was true, but now they make the best stories and life lessons (which I will tell you another time).
So-called ‘wrong’ choice #2: 5 years ago I broke up with my boyfriend cold-turkey. We didn’t speak for 7 months and I thought I made the right choice. When I saw him again on a party of a shared friend I cried ‘what did I do? I was such an idiot letting him go!’ The next day I decided to write him a letter, tell him how sorry I was that I made a mis-take and that I wanted to change to make it work again.
He responded.
We got back together.
Mis-take? Yes.
‘Wrong’ choice? No.
What I want to say with this is, if you feel like you want to quit your boring ass job, if you feel you want to travel the world, if you feel you want to leave your partner, want to go make new friends, try a new hobby or loose yourself over a new sport. Go do it.
Find out for yourself if it is a ‘wrong’ choice or not.
Should I have just stayed together with my boyfriend? Probably. Why give him the heartbreak? Did I want to? No. I was doubting us and just couldn’t shake that feeling. Now we’re 8 years in and I know for 100% sure he is the guy for me. Never doubted our relationship again.
Should we have bought a newer van with less motor issues? Probably. Did I want to? No. I love that it’s old and quirky, it’s special, it’s fun, it’s adventurous and that’s what makes me feel alive.
Sometimes you have to make mis-takes to know for sure.
Sometimes you have to make a ‘wrong’ choice to find out.
Everything I learned from those breakdowns with our van, from the breakup with Jur, from the stress of no income when I quit my job and had no idea what I was doing with my business, all of it made me grow. I had to step up. I had to trust that I could find solutions, that I had the skills and mindset for them. I had to take risks and try with possibility of failure.
It all turned into a big bucket of life experience that turned into anecdotes I will tell you about with pride.
I made all my ‘wrong’ choices the right choice.
Because I learned from them.
You can too.
There really are no wrong choices in life when you ask me. The only things that are “wrong” is not making a choice at all or not learning anything from it.
If you would ask me now: ‘San, how do I make the right choice?’ or ‘San, how do I not make the wrong choice?’ this is my answer ⬇️
Don’t ask anyone for advice.
If you can feel the decision in your heart or gut before there is room to overthink, go with it.
Trust yourself that you have the (mental) strength to find solutions when problems appear because they will.
Find a smile in every shitshow
me and Jur still smiling when our van was being towed from the middle of nowhere in Scotland because the guy driving the tow-truck was the best and made it all better!! Go make mis-takes! Even mis-takes can make a decision right because you learned something from it. Don’t be afraid to try another take, it makes life so much more fun 🤪
I will make all my mis-takes again in a heartbeat and I hope you will someday too!!
What is something you’ve been overthinking that you are afraid will be the ‘wrong’ choice? Send me a DM with your thoughts!
This week’s experiment to get into action mode and out of overthinking mode
Write down your three biggest ‘wrong’ choices. The ones you still cringe about. The ones others still remind you of. The ones that felt like failures at the time and you want to shamefully forget.
Then ask yourself honestly, what did I actually learn from that? And was it truly a ‘wrong’ choice or just a mis-take that shaped me?
Use that list as your fuel 🔥 Because if those ‘wrong’ choices made you who you are today, what does that say about the choice you’ve been overthinking right now? 👀
Comment your biggest mis-take and what it taught you. I want to know!!
About the author:
Hi, I’m Sanne 🙋🏽♀️ Writer & Experiment Coach, and to be honest, just a total nerd who built a life that is full of unconventional choices (which somehow made me the happiest I’ve ever been). I did it all on my own, struggled, doubted, cried, laughed, researched the decisions I made and I don’t want that anymore. That’s why I started Unedited & ALIVE, a community a.k.a. city where we stop overthinking, stop overanalysing, stop postponing, and actually move onto The Doing Part, one experiment at a time.
Why experiments? Because we are perfectionists! And otherwise we will never start. Experiments take the edge of, there is no right or wrong. We’re just gathering information when we experiment. Afterwards, we can make the decision to pursue or abort. That’s what I love about it.
Thanks for reading Unedited & ALIVE!
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I write for women who keep overthinking and are done waiting for the perfect moment to start. Here, we experiment together unedited, just as we are! 🔥 This isn’t some newsletter, it’s a city of women ready to communicate freely, dare do it, fail and explore more.