Una Palabra Sola Episode 16, la elección
It all comes down to choices… how are you choosing to show up in the world? Kick inertia in the teeth with these three check-in questions.
elección: (n) choice, decision, election (la acción de elegir)
Gender: la (feminine)
Synonyms: selección (selection, picking), la libertad (liberty, freedom), elector (voter), votar (to vote), la votación (voting), la voluntad (choice, will, wishes)
Antonyms: abstenerse (not vote), refrenar (to refrain), ignorar / no prestarle atención (to ignore), descuido (lack of attention)
From the Latin “ēlectĭo”, choice, selection, election
Moments turn into minutes, and minutes turn into your life. Aprovecharla. La vida es para gozar, amar, crear, cuidar, significar.
For reflection:
Are you happy with your choices about who, what, when, where, and how you spend your time? ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
What do you want to do more of? What do you want to do less of? (How do you want to be more? How do you want to be less?)
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Como antónimo de elección, there’s a lack of attention or ignoring something. What have you been ignoring? What’s been slipping through the cracks?
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Breathe into the power of equanimity… what is there, is there. There are no feelings about it. Now, think about one habit you’d like to start: no debating, no deciding, just doing for 5 minutes. How does that feel?
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TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
Hola y bienvenidos, hello and welcome to Una Palabra Sola, where we get to learn Spanish one word at a time. I'm your host, Megan Miller, founder and teacher at Aprovechar Language Solutions. Empezamos and let's dive in. Hello, and welcome back to Una Palabra Sola, a new episode where we get to learn Spanish one word at a time. And if you were listening to this when this podcast is dropping, it is November. Noviembre. And noviembre is famous for a lot of reasons. In the U S it's where we practice gluttony with Thanksgiving and basically, watch Christmas movies before then. For other countries it is where the winter season starts and preparations for Christmas or whatever kind of winter pagan holiday tradition that you might have. It is also famous, at least in the U. S., for one more thing, which is, it is famous for being an election month. This is when we elegir, or elect, a new president or a new whomever to govern us. With November being historically the election month. It's got me thinking about elecciones, which brings us to our word.
1:34
La elección es un sustantivo. It is a noun. It is feminine, la, because remember you have that cion at the end. So, la elección, usually, not always, but 98 percent of the time that C I O N has that LA in there. It is a noun, it is un sustantivo, and una elección not only is an election, it is also a choice and a decision. So when I look it up in my María Moliñer and my Real Académica Española, it is la acción de elegir. So, la acción de elegir, the action of choosing. So, as you can guess, elegir is a related verb, and that means to choose. So, elección really comes from elegir. If we're doing a chicken and an egg scenario, I would imagine that elegir came first, and then elección was the action of choosing, choice. So, etymology, this is from Latín. Por supuesto, electio, or a choice, selection, or election. You have selection and election. Selection, you basically have a few choices, and you select, you choose. Which is also a sinónimo. Selección is a selection or picking, right? You're picking and choosing which of the things that you want.
Otros sinónimos, you have libertad, liberty or freedom. And these other synonyms, sinónimos, are where you see the voting piece of this. So the actual democracy of voting for someone and electing someone to do something. You have un elector, which is a voter. You have the verb votar, to vote. These are all sinónimos de elección, remember. Una votación, or voting. La votación es la acción de votar. Similar to elección being la acción de elegir, votación is the action of voting or the action to vote. And then you also have, and this is a strange one, it comes up a lot in literature. Voluntad. Voluntad is one of those words, it has a bit of a weight to it because it means choice. It also means will and it means like wishes. Like, no tengo voluntad, I don't have the ganas, I don't have the wishes, I don't have the fucks to give for something. And it is just an español culto, or a proper Spanish way to say, like, choice, will, wishes, ganas, fucks, whatever you want to put in there. That is voluntad. You can also have things like por voluntad. This is by choice.
4:37
And this is very, very important because from a historical perspective, if we're thinking about Spanish in a historical perspective, it generally was a little bit of an elite and then just everyone else. Right? Like, making it so that everyone was under that little elite rule. Whether it was conquering with all the conquistadores that would just come in and rape and pillage and say, you're under my rule now. Or if this was the colonialism of, yep, rape and pillage and you're under my rule now. Or if this was even the more recent, recent in the last 100 years, dictators of Latin American countries. And this is just in general, I can go into a whole big thing with this and would rather not today. As we're talking about elección, I am elegiendo, I am choosing not to, but that is a whole big thing as well.
Just from a historical or cultural perspective, the power of having la libertad, the power of having la voluntad, the power of having to - el poder, right, the power - to choose, el poder de elegir, is very important and it's very close to home for a lot of people. So when we talk about elecciones, sometimes, yes, we are talking about elections. At the same time, we're also talking about choices and decisions.
6:11
This is choices and decisions that you make for yourself, choices and decisions that you make for your immediate circle, and then also choices and decisions that your community makes, that your state, country, condado, whichever makes, that your country makes. We're all just part of a bigger body of people here. And this is where las elecciones are super-importante.
As we talk about some antónimos, antonyms. Things that we don't do when we choose. You can have la apatía, which is just pure apathy, like, not even going to go into nihilism here, but you also have abstinerse, to not vote, to abstain. Refrenar, to refrain. Ignorar, to ignore. This is an important one. This next one: no prestarle atención. This is also to ignore, and this is the weird ignore, where it literally means like, not paying attention to yourself. No prestarle atención, so not paying attention or ignoring. And this is where I think having the power of elección, the power para elegir, this power to choose, gets stuck a little bit. It's not that we're actively ignoring it, we just aren't paying attention to it. We aren't actively trying to be apathetic. But in this world where news is coming at us so much and information is coming at us so much, there's only so much that our brains can handle and choose to pay attention to, right? So, no prestarle atención is simply to discredit. And this is where you have descuido, el descuido, which is like a lack of attention, too. So, the definition of the antonym of choosing is not another act. It's actually lacking that act.
8:27
I'm going to say that one more time because this is real weird philosophy. So, you have the la elección, right, to choose. And the antonym or the opposite of that is not defined by taking an action. It's rather defined by a lack of action. And this is where I think real life can seep in. Because it's not like we're actively trying to ignore something, but we aren't taking action on it. There's a lack of attention, there's a lack of action. Que no nos prestamos atención, que tenemos descuido. Right, we aren't taking care of something, we aren't paying attention to it. And this is the opposite, or the shadow side, of la elección.
For related words, I already said elegir, which is really the motor of all of this. And that is to choose. The act of choosing is elección. Elegir is really that act, right? To choose. You can also have elegido or elegida. And this is chosen. So this is both a participle, and it's a gerund. And what that means is you can have someone Que está elegido or está elegida. And that means that that person was elected, or that person was chosen. You can also use this in your present perfect tense, which is like, he elegido, has elegido, I have chosen, she has chosen… the next bachelor, whatever. So, you can have elegir, which is really that motor. And then elegido means chosen or elected. And this is all coming from la palabra, nuestra palabra, elección.
10:19
How it's used, this really gives you the nuance of this pinche word, which is having this nuance of like freedom of choice, right? You can dejar algo. Leave whatever, una elección de alguien. Leave whatever to whoever’s choice. And some sinónimos of that is like voluntad or libertad. And what this means, this can be as simple as, where do you want to get dinner from tonight? Or, we're at a new place, like, what do you want to order? Eh, I'm going to leave that up to you. I'm going to leave that completely in your hands. It's my will. And I'm just going to exercise that freedom to be like, yeah, whatever, you choose. It is básicamente dejando or leaving something to someone else.
You can also have la propia elección, which just simply means own choice. You can have, oh, es su propia elección. It is his or her own choice to do something. It has that nuance, that matiz of like, make your bed and lie in it. Harvest both the good and the bad. That can be both good and that can be both bad. Like, oh, well, es su propia elecición vivir en, I don't know, África. It's, it's his own choice to live in Africa, whatever. That means that he might not come home for the holidays, but no me importa. I'm going to have that descuido, that lack of attention, or I'm just going to ignore that fact because I have feelings about it. So, harvesting kind of both the good and the bad. And really when we think about la elección, everything comes down to that choice. Everything in our lives comes down to a choice. You're here because somebody chose to mate with somebody else and chose to keep you and here you are. It also reminds me of, because remember, elección, this is both a choice and a decision, right, as well as that election.
12:32
On the interwebs, so it must be true, I saw this quote from Anna Wintour, editor at Vogue, very famous. It kind of hit me a little bit, where she said, “I think possibly what people working for one hate the most is indecision. Even if I'm completely unsure, I'll pretend I know exactly what I'm talking about and make a decision. The most important thing I can do is try and make myself very clearly understood.” So that quote is attributed to Anna Wintour and basically hits home the impact of better to have made the wrong decision than to be constantly stuck by inaction. We have what we call analysis paralysis, which personally, I hate. I don't know why I hate that phrase so much, but it just makes me feel like you're never going to get out of it. For example, I've been sitting on a task for three weeks. It's a big task. There's a lot of printing and mailing and things involved as I'm trying to reach other people around my corporate membership offering.
And it does take quite a bit of time, however, to be completely honest, para ser honesta contigo, a lot of the time has been stuck in this weird analysis paralysis. Like, am I doing the right thing? Am I talking to the right people? I don't know. Let me do some more research. And as an entrepreneur, that is probably the worst thing that I can do. Because any kind of forward action is stalled by my own stupid frontal lobe, as it sits there and tries to think through all of these different things and makes a lot of stories about something. It is better to have just done it and learned, than to continuously put it off. And you probably already feel this, but if you don't, let me tell you from a lot of experience, it takes a lot more energy to be anxious about something and not do anything about it than it does to have the energy to just fucking do it.
14:59
And this is really where, of course I'm going to take my own advice, but also to give you some more. This is the true power of habit work. So, what I've seen with habit work is that you don't have to choose or decide. You simply do. The best habits are those that you don't even think about. So, task aside, like, if I actually had a habit of like, okay, every Monday at 2pm, I'm going to work on this one thing, and I'm going to do it for an hour. No questions, no choices, no decisions. Like, how cool is that? How cool is it to think, alright, 9pm, time to go brush my teeth. There are no feelings about it.
You don't sit there and you have to decide, like, oh, which toothpaste should I use, or should I do that before doing that before doing that? No. 9pm, time to brush my teeth. Like, this is the power of habits and routines. Oh, 6am, time to get up. The best times that I have, the best mornings, are those that I don't sit there and debate with myself. I don't contemplate, oh, well, if I sleep in today and then go to the gym later, or if I go to the gym tomorrow. There's no bartering with myself. I just simply get up. A friend of mine who gets up at 5, 5:30 every day, I'm like, ugh, how do you do that? And she's like, I just do it. I can't think about it. If I think about it, I'm going to stay in bed. And I think about that every time that I'm sitting there in this stupid contemplation moment of 6am where my fake sun lamp is like, hey, it's now daylight, time to trick your brain and your silly optic nerves. And my alarm is like, hey, get the fuck up.
17:00
If I contemplate, I'm going to have a worse morning. If I just get up and do and honor the habit, it's so much easier. If you remember that TGIF, that Thank God It's Friday, Friday night TV lineup, which all of the best shows, like Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Boy Meets World, and all of the best shows: it's that same feeling. It's like, oh, it's Friday, it's 5 o'clock, I want to go and watch this show. Oh, it's Tuesday, it's 6am. I'm going go to the gym. That's why good habit creation is so freaking powerful in language learning. Because there's no debating, there's no deciding, you're just doing. And the key thing with habit creation is doing it in a way that works for you.
So, whether that is having a list of activities and you're like, OK, time to honor my Spanish practice, it's Tuesday at 6pm. What am I going to do? I'm going to listen to a song and I'm going to read a paragraph, whatever that is, that's the key: is just building that habit that works for you, and also works with you, and doesn't work against you. Because the best habits are those that don't take any thought. Maybe it's for five minutes a day. If you go longer, okay. If you're a little shorter, okay. Also, the key with habits is that feeling of equanimity. The feeling of equanimity is what is there, is there. There are no feelings about it. You hear, see, feel, taste, smell, whatever is there. If your habit work is on Thursdays on the way home from the office, you listen to a podcast, and you are taking public transportation, and the guy next to you is just cutting farts like no other, that is equanimity. You can do what you can to get away from that, but it's going to be there, so might as well do your habits. If your Spanish habit is Friday morning at 8am before the day starts, or Friday afternoon at 3pm when we all hit that wall and start to say, yep, that's a Monday problem, that equanimity: what is there is there. If you didn't sleep well the night before, okay. You're still going to do your habit. You're still going to do your practice. How can you be gentle with yourself?
19:40
The nuance, como una elección, is in the doing. The habit is non-negotiable. The habit doesn't take any decision. It doesn't take any contemplation. It doesn't take any kind of negotiation. It is what it is, and it's always there. But that elección is what you do with that time. Having that freedom and liberty around your habits. And quite honestly, it all depends. It depends on how each of us chooses to exist in the world. Because there's this delicate balance in being so rigid that you are not enjoying life. Because you're so rigid, and oh my god, I can't go to that party on Wednesday, because Wednesday is my day to do this, this, and this, and god forbid I move it, right? So, there's that delicate balance, and being so rigid that you aren't enjoying life. But also having habits that support the life that you want to live.
Habits such as brushing your teeth in the morning, in the evening, whichever. Habits such as exercising. Habits such as meal prepping, if that's your thing. Habits like language learning, if that's also your jam, which hopefully it is if you're listening to this. Whatever healthy habit that you want to have- or, even unhealthy, right? We all have these little snacks of things that we like to do that are not really the most healthy, but they give us that joie de vivre. They give us that little joy of life.
21:22
It's all about where that delicate balance is, and making sure that whatever habit you have, you're still having that power of elegir. You're still having that power of having una elección, of taking una elección, right? You're choosing, you are actively choosing, you are actively deciding something. Now, with decision fatigue, of course, this is where you can kind of simplify your life as much as possible, but this is that importance of taking those choices and decisions. Why? Because you choose how you show up. This is in appearance. It is in energy. It is in curiosity. You choose to magnetize or repel people. That choice, that's your secret sauce, that's your vibe, if you will… and just because you choose something one day, doesn't mean that that is your choice for the rest of the week, the month, the year, because you need to lean into the fluidity.
You may choose - for example, I went to an event, and it probably was not the best time. I was very tired, I was very frazzled, I was just kind of not in a great energy space, and the event itself was not super-energizing. So, I made a choice. I was like, okay, well, I'm going to get the fuck out of here as soon as I can and go and try to get some of that energy back. Right? That is a choice. I stand by that choice. And, hey, at least I went. I went; may not have been my best self, but I was good enough, and that is a choice. I decided to do that. That decision, right? I don't know about you, there's a lot of decisions in life. And I've always heard the advice, if you don't know what to decide, flip a coin because then you'll know which side you're rooting for.
23:31
I'm not going to lie, sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't. You have to remember though, remind yourself, done is always better than waffling. Because waffles are delicious to eat, but not so delicious to act out or be a part of. In fact, that was one of my codenames for a coworker was Waffle, because they just waffled so much. It was one day, oh, I'm going to do A. The next day, I'm going to do B. One morning, they're like, yep, let's do C. The next afternoon, let's do D. And I couldn't figure out what they wanted because they couldn't make up their mind. It goes back to lovely Anna's quote, where, quite honestly, even if you're completely unsure, even pretending to know exactly what you're talking about and making a decision moves you forward. You may not be going forward in the exact way that you want, however, now you know. Good is better than stuck. Done is better than waffling. When something is done, you have the chance to fix it, reframe it, learn from it, versus just kind of keeping it whirling around in your head.
24:47
And back to the other use of elección, because as you can tell from our synonyms, there are a ton of voting synonyms with elección and elegido, elegida, chosen, elected. So, it is useful - I originally had this written in my little esquema, in my little outline- “it's always good”. It is useful. I'm going to take a step back from prescribing so much. It is useful to keep track of, certain countries’ election cycles and politics. Only for the countries that you're interested in, of course, but for example, you have a trip coming up, take a look at that country's election cycles and politics, if anything, just for the cliff notes.
It's one of the things I personally always check before a trip, because it just helps me figure out, like, who's who and some of the campaigns and signs, and if anyone wants to ask, my opinion as an outspoken American, I can have something other than “well, it depends. Tell me more about what you think.” It is useful to look at some of the election news coming out of countries and that is one part of elección, la elección, that I did not want to do a disservice to. It is very important. Democracy in general is important. So, it's important that we all vote and choose for the people who we believe, who we decide are going to be best.
26:31
So, as I was saying earlier, good is better than stuck. Done is better than stuck. And if you are feeling stuck, think about tus elecciones. ¿Qué eliges y por qué? You can choose and decide what, how, when, and who, I guess, you spend your time on, because you are in control. So much of these antonyms, that it was the lack of attention, or the lack of action, como descuido, or no prestarle atención, or ignorar, so some of these really come about when we give up our control. You are in control.
For example, sometimes a monthly or quarterly self-check-in is useful. I personally do weekly because ADHD. But it doesn't take a lot of time. I generally will put on a song or set my timer for five minutes, three minutes, whatever. Three questions help you take back some of this control if you feel like you've just been kind of awash or, or amiss in something, right? Three questions. Are you happy with your choices of how, when, and where you spend your time? Second question, how can you edit those? If you aren't happy with something, change it. Simple as that. And where do you need to decide, or where do you decide to spend more time and energy? Where do you decide to spend less time and energy? Because, quite honestly, putting this kind of decision time in is a double-edged sword. It's really good to monotask and to think; keep it in the forefront of your brain of like, yes, this is where I'm going, I'm happy with this, I want to do less of this. Because the hardest thing that we can do is wasting our life putting things off.
28:32
And, quite honestly, the second hardest thing we can do is completely chase our tail, going, what makes me happy, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. Well, just fucking try something. Try it. Because then you'll know, then you can reframe, then you can learn from, then you can adjust. Because it's really about aprovechando or taking advantage of those moments. Moments turn into minutes. Minutes turn into your life. Aprovecharla. Aprovecharla la vida. Porque la vida es para gozar, amar, crear, cuidar. Y significar, because this is all about your priorities. What are you prioritizing, where are your choices, where are your decisions, and how are you moving them or changing them or flowing with them from each day, week, month, and year to really live the life that you want to live.
And if you're choosing to prioritize el español, check out Deseo, which is my monthly program. It's only open twice a year, so check it out and see if that is a right fit for you at DeseoSpanishProgram.info. Y también check out the show notes, transcript, request a word at Aprovechar.me. Until next time, un abrazo fuerte. Gracias otra vez and thank you so much for coming along with me on this ride to Una Palabra Sola. Be sure to check out the show notes for additional worksheets and materials. If you have a word that you would like me to review, please feel free to let me know at AprovecharLanguageSolutions.com. Hasta la próxima vez, until next time!