Sometimes The Real World Looks Like Our Choices

​Some days you'll hear me shouting that the real world sucks. It's true. I'll also confess that at times in my life - many times, honestly - I have found it easier to blame the real world for my challenges than to accept personal accountability for them.

If the real world sucks, and I spend two decades or so using alcohol to hide from it, at what point did my choices become more a reflection of 'my' real world than any real world 'out there.'

Or, if I know I have a path where I can personally contribute to making the real world that sucks a better place, but day after day I find reasons to delay following that path, am I not to some degree being a little too harsh with my judgment of the world?

Listen, my life's passion is helping people understand how their real world experiences influence their capacity to make healthy decisions. Real world is NOT inconsequential. And no two people have the same real world.

Yet, even if no two people experience the world the same way, all people's ways are built on their next decisions.

If we're not careful, the world can beat us into a space of believing we no longer have a choice. Maybe our next choice can't paint a picture of the world we most long to see, but it sure as heck can influence its shape and color.

My words may not change the world. So maybe I should quit writing? I feel like the real world would like me to make that decision.

But I won't.

It turns out if we long enough scream the real world sucks - the world sucks the life out of us.

Our only defense is to fight back with life.

With living.

One healthy choice at a time.