One of the most undeniable, and inescapable, experiences of living is the experience of making decisions based on choices. There is this whole debate of “total free will” vs “zero free will” but eventually the truth is in the grey areas, you don’t have free-will in some aspects and you do have free-will in some – there are some things you can’t control and some things that you can. In the circles of spirituality there is a lot of emphasis on the whole aspect of giving up personal will, and though it’s a required phase in the journey towards balance (the phase of release) it’s not an ultimate end-goal of living – you only need to let go of the imbalanced momentum of the need for control so that you can work on a balanced control in your life, which is a part of conscious/aware living. There will always be cross-roads that we come to in our life where we need to choose one path over the other, where a decision takes you on a path that would be completely different from the other path, and there is no end to this experience of making decisions because life is eternal in its movement – you keep coming the cross-roads at the end of every changing reality. It’s normal to think along the lines of “how do I ensure that I take the right decisions” or “how can I avoid making wrong decisions”, especially when you know that a certain decision can have long-lasting effects on how your life experience pans out.
It’s not ambiguous to say that living is about experiencing, in fact the only way that you know you are living is by the fact that you are experiencing something – even the experience of “no experience” is an experience, it’s like the experience of nothingness. The core of taking decisions is about deciding what you want to experience, and again, the fact is that you can’t have it “all” in any moment; to experience something you have to exempt something else.
From the perspective of life all experiences have a value because the very nature of life-energy is to desire variety, to desire something new, to desire change – it’s not possible for any “being” to be okay with just one experience forever, even if its an experience of total bliss. Stagnation of any form is contrary to our nature as life-energy. Also, you can’t hold on to any experience, for long, because the very nature of the life-energy, that we are, is to keep “moving” – it’s never static. When you understand that all experiences have a value, and all experiences are fleeting/temporary, and all experiences lend towards a growth, and that you are bound to go through all the range of experiences possible (as a soul) and that it’s never ending (that there is always something else to experience), it gives you a different perspective on the whole question of “right decisions” – is any decision really wrong? This is not some philosophical question, rather it’s a very practical question with regards to understanding the reality of life. Since a lot of our fears come from the place of being afraid of taking the wrong decisions, and a lot of our psychological suffering comes from the place pushing away from allowing the “present experience”, it’s important to understand the reality of this whole aspect of making decisions, and see through any delusions about it.
Every decision lends itself to growth
It takes a certain level of awareness/receptivity to really understand the absolute perspective of life, the picture of totality. When you get this understanding about the absolute-ness of life, you understand that “everything has a value”, and it’s not just a conceptual understanding, and it’s not some “optimistic, wearing the rose-tinted-glasses” observation, it’s just a very objective observation about life – seeing it fully in its movement of light and dark nature (yin/yang). Of course as soon as it’s said that “everything has a value” there is bound to this question about “what’s the value in (—– fill in the blanks with all the horrific things that you see happening in this world —) “. The fact is that life as a movement is an interplay between the light and dark nature (yin/yang polarities), and in a state of low-awareness there is bound to be strong imbalances towards either the light nature or the dark nature, leading to imbalanced experiences. These experiences eventually cause a shift in awareness, where you learn from your suffering, and move towards finding conscious balance as a being.
The experience of suffering has its own value towards creating “depth” in a soul. It can’t be denied that some of the highest maturity is ingrained from an experience of suffering than an experience of a chocolate-flavored moment. It’s also true that the more mature you become the less you are prone to psychological suffering, but it’s quite impossible to find maturity without going through the suffering of immaturity because maturity is again a “relative” thing – you can only know maturity in relation to immaturity. So, if a decision, that you took, came from a place of “immaturity”, and it created suffering for you, it has its value in acting as a wake-up call for you to grow and become more mature, so in that sense it can be called a “wrong decision” from a relative perspective (because it created suffering for you) but it was a “valuable decision” from an absolute perspective. Even if you keep taking “wrong decisions” all your life, and basically lead a life of suffering, it still has its value in terms of soul. You can never know fully, before-hand, about how a certain decision is going to shape up, you can only guess and project and assume. Life is not moving according to some predetermined script, rather it’s a dynamic movement created from some original decisions that give rise to situations that need new decisions, it’s all about “learn and navigate” it’s not a “set course”.
In any given time you can only have a certain experience and you will be exempt from other experiences at that time. When you are living a physical life, time becomes a very significant factor – you have limited time as this body, you have limited time at any age (to explore aspects of that age) and physical things take more time to take shape compared to non-physical things. As a soul when you choose a certain physical body, to incarnate into, it’s a significant decision because it ties you up for several years to that experience, and all forms of emotional/mental impacts can happen to you during this time in relation to the specific body’s design and proclivities. However, from a non-physical perspective, you also understand that as a “soul” you are an eternal being, and hence you can keep incarnating as much as you want, so there is no real “risk” in making decisions like choosing a certain body for an incarnation – it would just be one experience, in the pool of many experiences that you will keep having eternally.
It’s important to have this “non-physical perspective” to really understand that there is no risk in anything because of the eternal nature of your being. The only deal of taking a decision is that it causes you to have a certain experience for a certain period of time, and if you have an openness you will grow/evolve from that experience, and the wisdom spawned from this growth allows you to make a different decision – this is an eternal movement of living.
Using your instinct for making decisions
Eventually you need to come to a place where you can stand on your own two shoes while taking decisions without using any external influence as the primary source on which you depend. You can, of course, listen to the external influences with an open-mind, and garner any useful guidance, however, you can’t fully depend on anything external as your crutch for taking decisions. Also, if you do take a decision based on the guidance of some external influence, you need to take full responsibility for your decision and not place the responsibility on the external source – if the decision ends up creating some undesired consequence, you need to take responsibility for it instead of blaming the external source for it (after all it was you who made the decision to follow the guidance of the external source). There are people who conveniently blame the outside for their decisions and thus never develop the maturity to take full responsibility for themselves.
Again, it’s important to keep in mind that there are no “wrong decisions”, there are only paths that are taken, and every path eventually is a journey of its own accord that lends itself to your growth and betterment, especially if you are open to the experience that comes through instead of sitting in a mindset of blame, resentment, guilt or despondence. In fact there is no such thing called the “perfect decision” because every decision is bound to have some light nature consequences along with some dark nature consequences, it’s just a fact of life that every reality is a mix of light and dark aspects.
If you have a delusion about some “perfect reality”, you are bound to feel upset about all your decisions in one way or the other because you will see that every situation has some dark nature aspects present in it – you can’t ever create a reality where you feel completely fulfilled because it’s not possible in the very nature of life. Nowadays it’s becoming a fad to consult one’s “spirit guide”, through spirit channelers, about certain decisions, with the idea that the spirit guides should be “all knowing”. The fact is that, eventually, even the spirit guides are external sources and you can’t be certain that they have a full cognizance of the aspects of physical reality (as they dwell in the non-physical plane) – even among spirit guides there are ones who are more mature and ones who are less mature, depending on their wisdom based on their experience of living. Some people depend on astrology, or such other “prediction-based” methods, as the basis of making decisions, and again one has to understand that there is no such thing as “absolute certainty” to anything because the very nature of life’s movement is highly dynamic – if astrologers were “all knowing” they should be able to predict every natural disaster that’s going to strike and send out a warning before hand.
The bottom-line is that you can’t simply depend on any source as the “right source” for taking all your decisions. Knowing this can be a cause of insecurity or a relief depending on how you see it. Eventually, it makes a lot of sense to start taking decision purely based on your instinct, while learning to take responsibility for each decision, knowing that there are no perfect decisions, and knowing that all decisions eventually lend themselves to growth and experience. There is a definite value towards gaining insights and understandings from external sources, spending time doing the required research, and using your past experiences as a learning medium, however, in the end you would simply have to take a call based on what feels like your “instinct”. The deal about instinct is that it’s not just something that’s “in born”, it’s something that grows as you grow as a being – the more balanced/mature you are the better your instincts. However, you don’t have to wait till you sense that your instincts are “perfect”, rather you simply connect with your instincts in your current state of maturity, and learn to make independent decisions based on your instincts, with the attitude of openness towards growing from each decision that you make.
Instincts can be blurred by emotional/mental momentum
Your instincts are bound to be sharper when your awareness (or the capacity to observe/analyze) is not blurred by a barrage of emotional/mental momentum. In the state of imbalance, a lot of decisions come purely from the pull of the past momentum, and hence we seem to be repeating our realities, and our experiences, without any real growth, until we hit some threshold of suffering which causes a certain shift in our awareness, where we let go of living from the unconscious tendency to be lost to the past momentum. It’s important to release the momentum of emotional/mental pull, so that your decisions are no longer coming from the place of total identification with the mind movement or the emotional movement. For example, just imagine that you have a strong momentum of the mental/emotional state of “lack of love”, in which case your decisions can come purely from this place of imbalanced lack where you cling to anyone who gives you some approval/attention/acceptance, and thus become open to exploitation or blind-trust. You can read the post – The Phase of Release – for detailed insight on how to work towards releasing the past emotional/mental momentum.
Of course, just because you are free of the past momentum, and have found an inner balance, doesn’t mean that all decisions would be easy for you. There will always be some decisions that can be a real challenge in terms of choosing one path over the other, where both paths seem to have an equal allure for you, especially the ones that can have a long lasting impact on your reality. In such a case one has no choice but to sacrifice one path over the other, in full cognizance that one can’t have it all. In fact, the process of making decisions can be a much more challenging process as one grows in awareness, mostly because one is more clearly aware of the light and dark nature aspects of every decision – it’s also true that some people who grow in awareness also become afraid of taking decisions, and thus try to detach from physical living in a bid to escape the deal of taking constant decisions. However, higher awareness also means that you can take more prudent, and aligned, decisions in a very conscious manner, learning from each decision, taking full responsibility for it.
As your awareness grows it becomes even more imperative that you become free of emotional momentum (by allowing the phase of release) so that you are not dictated by the fear-energy or the energy of boredom (meaningless-ness towards life), and you gain a clear perspective about life in terms of understanding there is no escape from “living”, and that living entails experiencing the light and dark nature aspects in every reality. Don’t use the concept of “surrender” as some means of hiding from the need to take decisions. The whole pointer of “surrender” has its value during the phase of release, where you simply allow yourself to be open to what arises within you (or around you), until you sense that there is no longer any intense momentum of emotions or mind-pull that dominates you. However, it’s important to understand that the phase of release is just a transitional state towards coming to a place of inner freedom from where you are required to operate in a state of balance, using your awareness towards living consciously, making controlled decisions where needed and letting-go of control where needed.
Insightful as always sen.
My request is, can you talk to us a little about the concept of time? We have spiritual teachers teaching is to train our minds to be as present always because time bound thoughts cause suffering wich seems right because to truly enjoy life we would have to be present to take it all in,but the ego is time-bound and training the kind seems like a forceful technique. What is your understanding on “time”?
Any debate over ‘total free will’ versus ‘zero free will’ is mind-based, so there is not a clear answer. We have free will (mind/ego), which might sometimes be at odds with divine will (our lifestream). We are free to choose anything, but will find suffering when we choose differently from what our lifestream sets up for us. What seems a paradox to the mind really just reveals the limit of the mind’s point of view.
If instead we say we are free to choose to follow spirit, there is no paradox. Rather, we choose to live in tune with our lifestream. Instead of seeing two wills, we see a will and a path of least resistance (lifestream). The path is ever-changing, as our earlier choices change what possibilities remain or appear. We choose at a cross-roads, which makes some possibilities disappear and others emerge. Thus there cannot be a rigid plan for our lives – our choice/will creates the possibility of what comes next through our lifestream, which in turn steers us toward growth. Both ‘wills’ work together, suffering is a reflection of them being out of tune or balance.
This post says this well – as always, Sen, you are very good at making complex ideas easy to grasp. This website is enjoyable to read and ponder.
an another masterpiece.
Good post, Sen.
Thank you, Sen. You’re always there when I need it.
This really confuses me.. So you release the ego to live according to live stream.. But is living without an ego really possible? I see some real value in having an ego – it’s there in the first place for a reason, isn’t it? It’s easy not to have an ego when I am alone for example, but when I am with other people and someone is mistreating me, if I have no ego that says, “hey man, that’s not ok!” then I get walked right over, don’t I? but then how do you determine what is the “truth”, or who is right or who is wrong in a situation like that?
Also, you say, you release the ego to become in tune with lifestream, to release negative energy and that everything will happen naturally… does it really? In this entry, you talk about all the decisions one has to make with wisdom from past experiences, and accept responsibility for the suffering that it potentially may cause…. doesn’t that put the person kind of back to where he started in the first place?
I’ll be honest. At times, I am very confused about the whole thing of spirituality… The question burns within me. I had come to a point that everything around me made sense for a bit, on several occasions. Life seemed like the ultimate mother, super fair and wise in the long run, no matter what I am going through. Everything in my past seems fair and for a good reason. And I also realized how little I know, and how my view of things is extremely limited. I didn’t and don’t want my past to put a veil over my current view of reality. I realized how my ego was causing me suffering… I tried to let go of it, compassionately… without success mostly – as you can see! haha. maybe I’m not doing this right. But who is making decisions based on past experiential wisdom and who is suffering through “relatively bad” decisions if ego isn’t there? How does one live like that? Acting like just a consciousness…
I don’t know what is right and what is wrong anymore, Sen.
Keba, I don’t talk about “living without an ego”, the pointer is always to come to a place of a balanced ego, which is eventually a balance between being selfish and being self-less, being connected with your personal preferences while also having a responsibility/openness towards the collective. Working on the state of balance involves two phases 1. the phase of release (where you work on releasing the past momentum of imbalance through consciously dis-identifying with it, without suppressing it within you, which is what the “state of allowing” refers to) 2. the phase of conscious living where you work on being objective, connecting with your body/mind/personality preferences and aspects like responsibility/integrity towards collective, working towards being a functional being who is has a balance between the personal and the collective requirements.
Thanks for your insight into decisions. regarding instincts, i have a different view.
We are born with survival instincts like fight,flight,hide,surrender and freeze. Its not someting we pick up on the way and fine tune. Our very presence here is because our ancestors survived using a combination of these instinctual responses to traumatic situations. These survival lessons are passed on to succeeding generations.
Every decision that we make is decided by our dominant survival strategy which we have inherited From some ancestor in our gene pool. For example a peron with a dominant fight instinct would keep making decisions which would lead him/her to a fight and similarly thosee who have hide as their dominant inherited instinct would always fly under the radar without attracting attention to themselves. The emotions we experience in our hearts are self perpetuating. they validate the decisions made which are pre fixed by our dominant instinct. Frustration,anger,hate etc would be common to a person who fights whereas fear, guilt,shame etc woul dominate a person with hide instinct and so on for other instincts.
It’s the inherited dominant instinct that determines our experience and therefore emotions we experience. Just observing emotions is only half the way, acknowledging the instincts would help going further in releasing the momentum of imbalanced energy
We are evolved animals and our inherited dominant instincts decde every response to our environment.
I believe that by observing our response we can easily find our dominant instinct/s. this by itself starts converting the imbalanced energy to balance. The book Waking the tiger by Peter Levine , in a very simple and lucid way explains how inherited survival instincts play a vital role in completing incomplete trauma.
Hi Sen,
I have been reading your articles and have been going back to them repeatedly as a source of finding answers and peace. Thank you so much for sharing them. Now, I have a curiosity and would like to hear your thoughts about the idea of “opposites attract” in relationships. Is there truth to this? And what is driving it?
Thank you sincerely,
John F.
John, there is no black and white rule for what “attraction” is based on, it depends on the individual concerned mostly with respect to their level of awareness, the growth they are moving towards, the experiences that they desire, a certain aspect of destiny (like two people who are destined to meet for a co-operative purpose) as well as possible non-physical aspects like being affiliated to the same soul-energy (called soul mates) or past connections based on past lifetimes. There are some good relationships that can take place between people who are “opposites”, where one person complements the weakness of the other person or helps the other person grow, and there are some good relationships that take place between people who are very similar where they enjoy the experience of sharing their similarities. So, it’s best not to get into any black & white thinking about what constitutes for a good relationship, rather you just need to allow yourself to explore your attractions within the limits of wisdom.
Hi Sen,
I was wondering if you could shed some light on the effects of nervous system imbalance (sympathetic more dominant than parasympathetic). I have always been an extremely nervous person and over the years I can really tell that my nervous system has gotten out of whack. Of course I am dealing with the psychological effects of conditioned stress and anxiety where I consciously see no threat, but also the physiological effects. My nervous system seems so primed, and its taking a toll on my body in many different ways. For very long I have reacted negatively to this, and I understand how this feeds it.
Do these practices of relaxed awareness eventually come to rebalance an out of whack nervous system and its physiological manifestations?
I Thank you for all your posts
I have only just recently signed up to receive your emails sen; and, based on what I have read, your updates have really made me think about the way I live every day, and how I can alter my thought processes to become more aware of myself. Thank you for such insightful and inspiring words. I try and utilize the skills and advice that you recommend almost every day.
Sen I’m growing frustrated and confused please help it would mean alot if you finally replied to a message,
I want to allow these feelings of agst and frustration and confusion but I do need an understanding about the difference between allowing and reacting, I’ve dis identified with my ego and I understand the patterns of the brain as well as high momentum, but how do I allow feelings without reacting I feel like there is something I have to do in order to hold myself from reacting I’m well aware of the feelings before I even react and yet I can’t control the feelings It’s been too long during this phase for me to still be reacting so strongly, is this wrong?
Benz,the core aspect of the state of allowing is the ability/openness to be with what arises without trying to get rid of it. As long as you are trying to get rid of something you cannot be totally open. The state of allowing cannot be used as some technique to get rid of something, rather it’s a pointer towards an openness that’s free of the need to get rid of whatever it is that’s arising in you – be it thoughts or emotions. Allowing is the absence of “reacting”, this includes not reacting to the reactions of your mind – the mind can react in any way to what’s arising, but you can simply be open to those reactions instead of going into the loop of reacting to the mind’s reactions. It’s not about trying to control the feelings, neither is it about trying to control the reactions of your mind to those feelings, rather it’s about an openness to allow the feelings and allow the reactions of the mind without trying to sort out anything. What you might notice is that you are trying to find “peace” and hence you are trying to get rid of anything that’s not peaceful, and hence you are trying to use the state of allowing as some technique to find peace which basically defies the very foundation of allowing/openness. You say that “I want to allow the angst and frustration, but I do need to understand the difference between allowing and reacting” – the deal is to stop buying into this question, and simply be open to experiencing the feeling of angst as it arises along with the reactions of your mind. You don’t need to answer any questions of the mind, if the mind goes into a “I am so confused” mode, just allow the feeling of confusion also, don’t try to look for answer to escape this feeling. The whole point of the state of allowing is to realize that it’s not “seeking understanding” that brings you freedom rather it’s the openness to the feeling of confusion/uncertainty – there is time and place for understanding, but eventually one needs to enter into a state real openness so as to get grounded in the inner freedom to allow what arises, including uncertainty/confusion.
Dear Sen,
Is it wise to make decisions whilst one is still in the midst of an imbalance? I ask this because I want to go back and study, however, I feel lethargic and lazy in my current allowing state and I have a fear that my mind may not be ready to go back. I do feel the “pressure” from life that I should be doing something (out of study for a year) but the last time I quit uni was because of my anxiety and I want to “experience” going somewhere with my life as opposed to doing little. Whilst reducing my mind momentum is my priority, how can I make sure that I make the right decision or am I able to leave it to “life”?
Dave, you can allow this idea to percolate within you for a few days without trying to force yourself to figure out if it’s right or wrong for you. If you sense that this idea stays strongly with you, over the days, then you might want to start exploring the practicalities of it – like thinking about the various courses you can pursue and the lifestyle shifts you need to make. As you go through the phase of release, and get more grounded in yourself, there is bound to be the “return of focus” phase where you need to start coming back to objective living, and this is usually triggered by some inspiration towards re-connecting with work, relationships and choosing specific lifestyles. If an idea/inspiration keeps persisting within you, then the only way to go forward is to explore it in some way – you can’t know what’s beyond the hill until you climb it, until then you can only guess.
Sen,
Can you elaborate on ‘soul mate’ concept, please. You mentioned in one of your writings that your view on the concept changed as you have progressed in your growth. I would like to know more.
Thank you
Sasha, one the ways the term “soul mates” get defined refers to souls that originated from the same “over soul” (their source stream is the same) and hence have similarities in personality. However, once a soul starts incarnating there are bound to be changes in the personality, based on growth/evolution and circumstance-based influences, and so a soul starts developing a personality that can differ from the personality of the “source” from where it originated. Hence the whole concept of being compatible with your soul-mate “forever” is not really valid, because over time you can lose your compatibility based on your growth and journey influences.
Another definition of soul-mates is when two beings get into a relationship and develop a bond (relatively positive bond) towards one another and the energy invested in this bond causes the souls to get intertwined over lifetimes. For example, when you meet someone for the first time, who’s a stranger, and you feel a strong connection in some way (a positive connection) it could be coming from some bonding that you shared over some past lifetimes. However, the deal is that you don’t have to “wait” for your soul-mate, you can just find a new connection in this lifetime and hence have a new soul-mate – just like how new relationships are built. You don’t necessarily have to wait for your soul-mate of a past lifetime. If you do bump into a soul-mate from a past-life time, then you have the advantage of some stronger connection stemming from your past closeness, but it’s also possible that you get bored of the “sameness” soon enough and you want to explore something new.
The bottom-line is that you are not really “tied” to anything/anyone in any rigid manner. There may be some past-momentum that brings two people together, something negative momentum like a feeling of resentment can bring two souls together to resolve their karma, sometimes just the past closeness (love) can bring two souls together to re-live the experience in a new form, but the past doesn’t have to dictate the future. As a conscious being you are no longer at the mercy of past-momentum, rather you can let go of its influence and work more from a place of objective thinking.
Hi Sen,
Thanks for yet another enlightening session that I just had after going through your blog. I have a query which I want to clear – For taking decisions, decisions which require some analysis and aren’t required to be made immediately, what is your thought on – Making a decision ie , validating and verifying it during Meditation? For all important decisions, would that be wise to analyse them while meditating so that if there are few negativities (Tiny hidden fears relating to the outcome) could be well identified and we make a decision that does not reek of unnecessary fears.?
I am facing a dilemma on making a decision on – What I want to pursue in my career. I find administrative services very fascinating job. And I really want to pursue that now. Now in order to finally go with my choice, I analysed that the preparation for the exam is quite exhaustive (perhaps the World’s 3rd toughest exam) and it requires me to study certain topics which are important but I find no interest in them at all (Infact I found them extremely boring in childhood). So now I want to achieve that goal certainly because I have a desire to do so, but also there are a lot of hindrances. How do I make the decision to really go for it or not?(I might develop an interest in those topics by giving my focus to them). I know that there would be no certainty of me clearing that exam, but still I would like you to share your guidance on How I should make a decision here?
Shiva,
You have already done a good job on analyzing the dark aspects of your desired reality, rather than just the light aspects alone. With the classes that you have no interest in, that’s part of the process as well and you just use wisdom to notice that if you want the end result of administrative services you have to go through them and in return not have much fun or entertainment. Basically, we get so scared at all the dark nature aspects, uncertainty, failure, work, no free time, think we can’t handle it, etc. We would rather avoid the dark aspects and look for security instead of facing them and growing from them.
Of course the meditative part you can certainly do in order to bring up and realize any fear within you. The value of this is simply to gain space from the fears and bring awareness and allowing to them so they can die in momentum and give a freedom to make your own choice. However, don’t dry to look for an absolute certainty that there will be some kind of sign that the decision you choose is the right one (just like you already understand there is no certainty in passing the exam). Even if there is a sign, you have to make the decision to follow it or not. It’s just like Sen discusses how you can never be absolutely sure a decision is the right one. This is when life really is put back into your hands and thus you have to making decisions using your own wisdom, and being open to understanding that things may or may not work out.
It is necessary to have enough inner freedom to make It could just be the fear of the unknown, or failure which of course is natural to our minds. Second step after you understand the fears, is using your own wisdom in your decisions, understanding that you do not know what will happen with your choice. As you return to living again (after the phase of release) you will notice you have to take more decisions on your own, without relying on an external force to give certainty, and with that you start making your decisions in a different way (and of course again remaining open to whatever happens).
Sometimes, you just have to be honest with yourself and accept you don’t know the right what the “right” decision is, in order to choose a path and willing to explore it (the light and the dark).
Also, remember that any decision that is made no matter what, will serve as your growth, especially if you’re open to the growth. For example, if you fail the exam, you just analyze where you went wrong or what you were lacking during it, or even if it was too tough for you, and then you either work on the areas of failure and try again or choose something completely different. In addition, those courses that you are not going to find interest in will provide a huge value to you, because they will reap you of fun and get you oriented towards working. I had many classes like this in my last three semesters, and they really have taught me the value of learning to do the work (no matter how much the mind does not like it).
One last thing, I am of course not telling you to take the course, or to avoid it. I am just saying, make the decision on your own ground, knowing that there will always be uncertainty in future decisions, and be open to how the results turn out. If they turn out great its fine and if they are poor its fine as well because it will serve for a huge growth within you.
P.S. There is another decision, where you could look for other means of learning about and getting accomplishments in administrative services. I do not know how much research you have done on other means of developing your administrative services career but just a thought.