When you’re growing up, trying to figure out the next step in your life, the easiest and most logical strategy is to look at what other people did when they were in the same situation. The fact of the matter is, that’s not always the best idea. Along the way that can create a lot of false expectations. When you come upon a point in your life when plans seem to mysteriously deviate, it’s easy then to get down on yourself and wonder why things didn’t work out like they did for everybody else. The reality is that their path was not necessarily made for you, and that’s okay.
Traveling is the analogy that makes most sense here. If I’m traveling from California to Florida, logic would tell me that the only way to go is by plane, but the reality is, that’s not true. I can drive, ride a bus, take a train, bike, walk, run, take a cruise, hitchhike, or make it a million other ways. All those means of getting to the end destination of Florida of course have their pros and cons. But the fact still is that there’s a countless amount of ways to reach the desired destination.
The same rules apply to getting to a certain point in your life or attaining certain goals. Yes, most people would fly to Florida because that was the best way for them, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the best way for you. Don’t think of moments in life as failures when they don’t follow suit with everybody else’s plans, but rather as deviations in the path that gave you the opportunity to learn something that everybody else didn’t get to learn themselves. In the end, if your path was the same as everybody else’s you’ve got no story to tell.
Finally, since I’m talking about life paths, I couldn’t finish this off without mentioning Robert Frost and his famous ‘The Road Not Taken.’ Cliché? Definitely. But I’m okay with that.
