Wednesday, May 18, 2016

the passenger

It's been almost 10 years since I was last in Iraq.  I've got to wait until March 2017 for that time line to pass.  It's taken me that long to understand a few things.   Probably the wrong things.

Such as: why was I so willing to die for my country?  Why was I not willing to put the effort in to to my own interests?

I guess this is the conclusion I came to.

Regardless of who you are, you are going somewhere.  You can easily think of it as a car ride.

The question is simple.  Are you driving the car, or are you riding?

It doesn't matter which you are doing.  You are going to end up somewhere.  Would you rather that be a place you decided.  Or would you rather it be a place someone else decided?

The interesting part of the equation is regardless of what you want to do, you are still going.  The car is still driving.  You can be in denial about that all you want.  But it's still going somewhere.  If you have children, think of yourself in the back yelling how you don't want to go to school as your parents take you to school.  All that complaining didn't help then.  It's not going to help now.

My days of dying for random ideas are gone.  Now, I have concrete things to protect.  I have  people that depend on me. They are small and ornery some times, but I still love them.  And they are still worth protecting.  It's worth it to provide them opportunity.

So figure out what you want to do.

Do you want to control what you can about the journey?  Or are you going to complain every step of the way.

Either way, you're going to end up somewhere.

Question is: is it a place you want to go?

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