Shootin' it Straight - Right Where I Want (FREE ACCESS)

With very limited exceptions, I’ve always held the belief that we are exactly where we want to be in life. More accurately, most of us are precisely where we deserve to be. I’m speaking of adults here, excluding children who depend on others for survival. The caveats are those who are mentally unwell, severely physically disabled, or otherwise legitimately hindered. The rest of us ought to take a long, hard look in the mirror before we look for landing spots for our poison arrows of blame.

We may not be satisfied with where we are financially. I may bemoan my relationship failures. It's easy to let the pangs of jealousy creep in as we look down the street at someone else’s apparent success. But self-loathing often becomes a convenient substitute for self-accountability.

My financial situation, good or bad, is often tied to my work ethic and drive. My relationship failures could easily be blamed on others’ shortcomings, or I could take responsibility for my own. The jealousy I nurture toward my neighbor might be better redirected into picking up an extra shift to afford that bass boat I envy. The “woe is me” act is best reserved for angsty teenagers, not grown adults. We all get as far in the race as we’ve earned. Sure, circumstances play a role. And yes, it stings to pay later in life for mistakes we made in youth. But those were still our choices.

Some people walk well-paved paths to their destinations. Others must clamor over boulders. But the destination is still obtainable, regardless of the terrain.

Not every move in life has to be perfectly mapped out. There’s room for failure and mistakes. But if poor decisions become a pattern over time, they will set you back, no matter how good your intentions might be later.

There are many choices in life, but two clear paths toward contentment or success. One is to pull up your bootstraps and get after it,  because the world is an inanimate object; it doesn’t care, and it can be worked around. The other is to be honest with yourself and make peace with having less “stuff,” aligning your lifestyle with your motivational drive. Neither path is a failure.

The guaranteed recipe for failure is to reject responsibility for the state of your life, to blame others for your poor choices, or to let envy become your primary source of drive. In one form or another, most of us are exactly where we deserve to be.

The beauty of life is that the steering wheel is in our hands. And if we’re willing, the road we’re on holds little sway over where we ultimately end up.