Take 60 seconds. Will your life be better or worse?

The funny, or not so funny, thing about your life changing is that more can happen to alter your course in 60 seconds than in a decade. A car accident, the sudden death of a loved one, a retrenchment, a diagnosis, a lotto win, saying yes to a date. After that … life won’t be the same.

It happened to 33-year-old Lisa Munro, who is now referred to as the former solicitor for the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Life changed when she hopped into a parked car for, literally, a minute and emerged to waiting police and a drug bust for carrying .65g of cocaine.

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But Munro is, or was, a solicitor. She knows the law. She can’t practice with a criminal conviction. She has avoided jail time, but has lost her job. The years of studying hard and working harder may as well of never happened and now that moment, that decision, is going to make Munro pay.

Last week, Andrea Lehane was walking across a pedestrian crossing in a shopping centre in Melbourne and was knocked down by a teenager on a mini-motorbike. The mother-of-two sustained massive head injuries and the decision was made by her family to turn off her life-support. This time, thanks to omnipresent video, the public saw the heartbreaking moment that took Lehane's life and changed her family’s lives forever.

Look at the news today. Thousands of lives turning on their axis within each story. The bad news moments are clear, visible and visceral. They strike and devastate. Closer to home we can pinpoint them too. That phone call, the knock on the door, the doctor clearing his throat, and then everything is different.

Life can go the other way too, of course. A moment can shift the trajectory to happiness, joy and success. But unless it is a Lotto win, the moments that come before positive change can be harder to pinpoint, as though some kind of milky film sits over them. As though we weren't responsible for them in the first place.

The friend who hurriedly sent off an email to her boss to put her hat in the ring for a promotion. She pressed send, then after that came the job, a move overseas, her own apartment in New York.

The night with friends, on a balcony, when the last cigarette is smoked.

The moment we say yes to that second date we’re not keen on.

The moment we stay that bit longer in the hallway of the house chatting to the woman who has just looked after your child on a playdate. Then we stay for a wine. Then we become such good friends we don’t know what we would do without them.

The moment we press send on that internet dating site we can't believe we've uploaded a profile to. The site we've always thought was desperate.

Those moments of small 'c' courage are harder to see. But they change our lives too.

Sixty seconds and life can go either way.