Choose Your Path

Success in life is about making choices. When making a decision, it is often difficult to determine which choice is the right one. Just as often, the right choice is a personal one. What is right for you, may not be right for someone else.

As you look back on choices you’ve made, you may determine that you could have made better choices. Don’t beat yourself up about it. Rather, give yourself credit for being able to grow, learn and recognize better choices in the future.

There is one choice that can be applied to any situation and that is choosing not to choose. When you simply let life push you in any direction without making a conscious decision at best you will make no progress. At worse, you could be led down a dark and dangerous path.

Drug abuse, obesity, alcoholism, crime are just a few examples of what is in store for those who choose not to choose. Nobody chooses to be obese – it just sort of happens. Most drug addicts would give anything to free of the uncontrollable urge to do drugs.

When I was a teenager, I was in an environment where drug abuse was common and expected. Everybody was doing it. The default path was to simple become part of that culture. However, I chose not to take drugs. I remember making a conscious choice not to abuse legal or illegal drugs (except caffeine but I did not know it at the time). Being born poor, I knew I had disadvantages in life and that doing drugs was not going to make my situation better. I consider that choice to be one of the most significant choices in my life.

Every time I would hear about someone I once knew who died from an overdose, ended up in prison or was seen lying on the street, I recognized that that was the default path I could have taken. I simply chose not to.

The choice to avoid drugs did have it’s difficult moments. I had to leave or not attend parties where I knew drugs going to be. I had to end or avoid friendships with people who used. I had to accept that I was going to be labelled as “not cool”. The terms “goody-two-shoes”,”narc”,”Momma’s boy” were just some of the labels thrown my way.

Despite my good choices, I did fall into alcohol trap however. For some years as an adult, I chose not to choose regarding alcohol. I knew and know now that there people who can consume alcohol without it being a major problem in their lives, but for me and my family history and the environment I grew up in, the default path led to over-consumption, alcoholism and all the other difficulties associated with drinking too much.

When I was in my mid-twenties, I chose to get out of the alcohol trap and get off the default path. The effects of drinking had only just started to erode the quality of my life so I believe I stopped before I became a full-blown alcoholic.

The important thing to remember is that we always have a choice. If you have been overweight for years, you can choose to take a different path. Sure it may be difficult and require a great deal of effort, but the choice is still yours.

Think about what you really want out of life and then choose to take the path to get you where you want to go.