If Only...

Have you ever wondered how many small things in your childhood or teen years would have had to be different for you to have ended up significantly different than you are today?

Think about it? I'm not even considering the obvious life-altering and impacting things like like car accidents, family suicides, cancer or similar occurences. I'm talking about chance meetings with someone who speaks small small truth into your life. Maybe it was the kindness of a particular teacher that never seemed to happen. The last minute invitation to go do something that you ultimately enjoyed more than life itself. Maybe it was a phone call you missed because of that last red light you hit or one you got because you made it through the last several green ones. Maybe it was an article that caught your eye in a magazine at the Jiffy Lube appointment you were hoping you wouldn't need for another 6 months. Maybe it was a random "hello" said in an uncomfortable period of silence that resulted in a lifelong friendship.

You see what I'm saying? The numbers of variables that go into each of us, what we enjoy doing, what we decided to major-in in college, what colleges we decided to apply to, what jobs we applied for, what person we ultimately decided we would go after for ourselves to love.

So back to my question. How many of these variables, if outcomed differently would have resulted in a completely different us? It's kind of a scary thought when you really consider the implications.

If your life is good today, might you have ended up a junky? Depressed? Suicidal? Living homeless upon the streets? Maybe living like some 80's era movie ambivolent party animal?

Or, maybe you are struggling with a pandora-box of issues that may not have been your reality had a few things occured differently when you were younger.

Sure puts a new twist on judging your neighbor whether literally next door or on the other side of the planet. How then are we to judge one anothers situation? What we know for certain is that all of us are a hodgepodge mixture of our combined experiences. Good and bad, we all have both to some extent. Some more than others. Some things that happen to us are accidental. Life happens. If you are currently breathing and can detect a heartbeat when your hand is on your chest, then it will keep on happening. Some things occur because of choices we make. This is a "duh" statement. But must be said because many look squarely in the face of their addictions or "issues" and blindly state "it's not my fault." It's Hans Solo's famous line.

It's not unknown that some of us walking-wounded would not have been so had their mom said "no" to an invitation to attend a particular college party. A one-time decision to disobey a parents advice led to a lifestyle of compromise that never had to be. Hans Solo was constantly trying to keep himself alive from "collectors" for money he owed them from gambling losses.

But ultimately HOW we respond to the difficulties we face is the determining factor in what the outcome will be. How we will end up is OUR choice. I've met people who suffered from some abuse growing up and ended up as spiteful, hateful, abusive people themselves. Then I've met people who endured some of the most horrific beatings and abuse and decided to not end up like their "parent." Seeing this cause-effect relationship, I must decide that regardless of the sum of all of the negligence, accidents, abuse, schooling, and ignorance creating each individual, the decision will still be theirs upon maturation to decide how they will respond to all future incidents and "whom they will serve."

So guess what? None of us escapes the need to make the same decision. Regardless as to whether it might have been different if only...