I had a conversation with a friend yesterday who is struggling with a major life decision. His wife is expecting and the decision involves moving back home to be closer to both of their families while sacrificing the job he has, or staying where they are, thousands of miles away from family and raising a child with just the two of them yet keeping his job. Frankly, I wouldn't want to be in his position. I gave him my opinion yesterday based on what is important to me, family, yet the more I think about it, the more disparate and difficult the decision really seems. Yes, family is important, but so too is a well paying job that eliminates at least some amount of stress in one's life. So what to do? Ultimately, I would have to say I don't know. In the end, I would base the decision upon what is best for his family and himself and attempt to arrive at a compromise that allows for the least amount of stress and the greatest amount of comfort. Still, not an easy decision and one in which a compromise will never satisfy all parties involved. However, the decision needs to be made. Our whole conversation eventually morphed from a decision about whether to stay or go into one about control and what kind of control we actually have in our lives. I am divided on this with two thoughts on the matter. On one hand, I would like to think that we do have a certain amount of control over our lives and how they pan out. Yet on the other hand, there are always situations that arise; marriage, children, death, any major life change, that are inherently beyond our control and occur when we least expect them or at the very least throw a monkey wrench into our grand view of what our life should be like. At what cost do we carve out our lives in such detail that we sacrifice all flexibility and ability to change? We can attempt to control all events that occur in our lives and sometimes, we might even be able to have an effect on them. I have found, however, that there are situation that no matter how we seek to control them, to bend them to our own will, that they will always run their own course, with or without us on board. There are many situations that we can control, yet there are also many that elude our best efforts at control. If we strive too hard to control the uncontrollable, what will we do to ourselves and those around us? There must be a balance, a point that we reach in which we either go along for the ride or be dragged behind kicking and screaming.
Its akin to that saying that we must "grab life by the horns". I have always been one that would mostly agree with that saying. Yet, when we grab life by the horns, we must be ready for anything. There comes a point when holding those horns that it becomes too much. The wrestling gets hard, the horns get slippery and we run into a crossroads, hold on for deal life while wrestling with the increasing possibility of getting trampled underneath, or swing ourselves onto the bull's back and see where it takes us. That decision to get trampled or jump on board is never an easy one to make and often times the line between control of the bull and loss of control is blurred by our own ego and futile efforts to gain the upper hand. Yet, doesn't gaining the upper hand sometimes mean jumping on top to tire out the bull? I'm not saying that we should ever let life escape our grasp for that would mean we give up. But perhaps the smarter decision would be to maintain our grip on those horns and occasionally decide to go for the ride. I have been in situations where I have had to make that decision, jump on top for the ride or get trampled underneath. When I heard that my wife was pregnant with our first child, I didn't know what to do. It meant the end of my life as I knew it and it didn't sit with me well right away. Yet, instead of fight it (which would have been futile), I climbed on board and have since made the best of it. The same held true with my decision to leave college to build my own business. Nothing was easy about those decisions, yet I did what I felt was best, hop on for the ride, and see where life would take me. Sometimes staying in one place (not necessarily a physical place) leads to stagnation. Sometimes change is good and the only way to find out what will happen is to embrace change and seek out opportunities that come along with that change. We must never remain blinded by our own ambition, our own egotistical goals, to the point where everything else passes us by in a blur of motion. Our peripheral vision is one of our saving graces. If we can keep our hands gripped firmly on those horns of life and still see the world around us, then at least we can see the what might be coming. If we put on blinders and fight tooth and nail for control, life will pass us by and one day we will wake up and be on our way out.
Perhaps the one saving grace that I have had through my life is that I have tried my best to approach every situation with the attitude that I will make the best of it and enjoy living life. Am I the master of life? Not by any means, I am merely a pupil struggling along with the rest of humanity, seeking out my path, stumbling at times, yet never giving up and laying down for a nap. I choose to view life as a sea of opportunity. My friend asked me what I would do in his situation. I gave him my answer based upon my present situation and felt that it probably wasn't the one that he wanted to hear. Yet, how could I honestly see things from his perspective when I never traveled down his path. I can attempt to walk a mile in his shoes, yet those shoes don't fit me and they never will. I can empathize with the decision he has to make, I can offer my opinion on what I would do, yet in the end, he has to decide what is best for him and his family. All I can do is offer my support for any decision he makes. Will his ultimate decision be one that I would have made? I don't know. His situation is completely different than mine and all I can do is hope and trust that things will work out the best for him. I know that whatever decision he ultimately makes will not be easy and he will question it every step of the way. I will talk to him again and help him work through it, but the best advice I could give is to never look back, only look at what you have in front of you and make the decision based on that. For myself, I have come to the realization that my life currently is beyond my control. Any attempt that I could make at controlling it would lead to failure. The best I can do right now is attempt to manage everything that is going on to the best of my ability and just keep my head above water. Its easier said than done, I know, yet as long as I focus only on today and not tomorrow, I should be OK. Ah, life, how you are perplexing, ornery, and full of excitement.
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