Make Your Own Choices

Make your own choices.  You have to.  You won't be happy if you don't.  You will be miserable if you let others decide for you.

And they will decide. 

There is no end of others telling you what is for your own good. 

Parents, teachers, siblings, friends, bosses, supervisors, priests, talking heads, the government all preaching at you, scorning you, ridiculing you, pushing you to do things you don't want to do.

They will run your life ragged if you let them.  Leaving you with no money, no time, no energy and nothing to show for your efforts.

Make Your Own Choices and Get Your Life Back Under Your Control

The problem when you don't make your own choices is that choices are going to be made for you...by others...and it will be rare that what they choose will line up with your vision of your life.

No matter how well meaning they are.

Your parents, your spouse, your friends, your boss, your religion and your government do not know what is for your own good.  They just don't.

Even my parents who I love dearly, who took care of me very well as a child and helped me through the dark years after I left my wife did not always choose well for me.

How could they?  Their vision of my life is not my vision.

My wife's choices for how I should be drove me to run from her.

My friends sometimes made choices for me deep into the night with a full load on that were not good for me.

My religion made me hate myself.

My government takes my money to kill innocents.

These are all choices made for me, by others, for my own good.

All choices I hate.

Make Your Own Choices
You Have To If You Want A Good Life

The better way to go about a fine life is to make every choice regarding what you do, where you go, what you eat, what you drink, who you know, everything...yours.

Yes, I

  • Ask for advice from friends and family and others whose counsel I respect.
  • Normally do a ton of research on my most major decisions.
  • Spent years researching and soul searching before leaving my wife.
  • Spent time making sure I did not want any more children before having a vasectomy.
  • Went through an extremely laborious process to get into my current job.
  • Study every large purchase I make, carefully thinking if I need it, researching, budgeting and planning.

All this by me. No one can tell me what to do anymore.

They try. 

But I just go on doing what I do. 

I am not belligerent, just intent on my life and my vision for it.

Make Your Own Choices to Stop Doing Something

The best way to make massive improvements in your life is to find out what you need to stop doing. It is not always about doing something, many time it is about the stopping.

The most harm is caused by not stopping

  • Drinking
  • Smoking
  • Drugging
  • Overeating
  • Pushing ourselves too hard
  • Staying with bad people
  • The whatever bad circumstances you are in.

So why don't we just stop? Why don't we leave bad situations? Why do we stay and struggle and stay and fight?

We are just so conditioned to never stop.  It is a built in mechanism, ingrained in us to never stop, never quit, just keep going. This is the idea that quitting is for losers. That winners never quit.

We are led to believe that in order to have courage we must never quit. Sometimes the most courageous thing to do is quit.

You have to learn and be mindful enough to stop.  You have to care enough about yourself to stop.

The people you admire the most have quit some terrible situation or circumstance they were in.

The good news is it becomes easier to stop once you start the process. 

Think on this

What do you think about when someone is right in your face making demands, lecturing, maybe even screaming at you, telling what you should do for your own good?

Are you happy?  Are you satisfied?  Is that where you want to be?

When my wife was giving me a vicious lecture I was thinking of suicide. I was hoping she would die.

I was not thinking that this is just such a great situation I am in and that I should just shut up and listen to her lectures and tirades and that I should just listen to her wisdom.

I just wanted it to end.

The stopping of all this crazy nonsense I was in was the only thing that mattered.

If she would not stop being the way she was to me, I was going to get away from her.

This is what I mean by stopping. I stopped letting her slowly kill me,making decisions for me,  by leaving her.  My level of awareness of how the power of negative repetition was harming me allowed me to make the decision to leave. This was the best decision of my life, and the hardest.

Stop doing what you have always done.

Stop waiting to live.  Stop waiting for others to decide for you.   Have enough self awareness to realize that enjoying your life now is the most important thing you can do for yourself.

Your world gets better when you make your own choices.  You know what is right for you.

Start With This Book to Make Your Own Choices

From James Altucher

James Altucher Blog

Choose Yourself!

This is an excellent book.  I only wish he had written it decades ago before my life got so far out of my control.

› › Make Your Own Choices

The only way I could become the happier man I am today was by leaving my wife.  You might be in the same situation I was in.  I suggest you take a look at my book - Leave Your Wife & Become a Happier Man with the 3 Step System.

Click to go to learn more about the book

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