My Life, My Choice

“Your life is the sum result of all the choices you make, both consciously and unconsciously. If you can control the process of choosing, you can take control of all aspects of your life. You can find the freedom that comes from being in charge of yourself.” – Robert F. Bennett

Growing up as kids, we have all been influenced by society and community surrounding us. Some of us wanted to play basketball like Michael Jordan. Some wanted to be President of the United States. Some of us wanted to play guitar in a band, traveling across the world playing to sold out arenas just like our favorite musicians. We all had role models, whether they were a sports star, an actor, or even our parents. We all wanted to follow in their footsteps and become successful just like them. While it’s good to have heroes and role models to look up to, we each have to make out own way in the world. While we may wish to be just like our childhood heroes, we have to make our own name in the world, and learn from our individual experiences, just like those who came before us did. While we should follow the advice and learn from the experiences of others, we have to form our own judgments and make our own choices based on what we have experienced in our lives.

As children, our parents drilled countless words of wisdom into our brains that more often than not we let go in one ear and out the other. “Yeah, whatever dad,” was a response that I used quite often after my father would finish one of his many stories about growing up and living life. “Boy I was just like you when I was younger,” he’d say. My dad had advice for everything, literally everything. Cars, sports, girls, farming, music, racing. You name it, he knew it. But I never really took his words to heart. I always thought I knew best. As time went on, I began to realize something, his words of advice started to really hit home. I found myself kicking my own ass for not following his advice. “Guess dad wasn’t so dumb after all,” I’d think to myself. But time and again, I’d make the decisions for myself; failing to heed the advice my father had given. Why do we do this? Why do we carelessly throw aside the words of wisdom that only come from experience? So often, we cast aside beneficial guidance only to realize that we were wrong. This is because we have to learn from our experiences and mistakes so that we know to make the right choice further down the road. We have to find out for ourselves what will happen if we make the wrong decision. We must learn from our own personal experiences, just as our parents did before us and their parents  before them.

How then does one draw the line between advice and control by an outside party? How do you know when to stand up and choose for yourself and go against the advice of another? We determine this by what feels right for us and by what we believe is the possible choice in a given situation. We as individuals chose to do what makes us happy, based upon our beliefs, our ideologies, and our values. For instance, if a person gives you advice on taking a high paying job that forces you to sacrifice the time spent with your family, they’re basing their advice off of what they themselves believe to be important in life. While it is important for us to listen to and consider the advice given to us, we must ultimately make the decisions. It comes down to us making our own choices. Not our parents, not our grandparents and not our friends. This is how an individual creates his or her identity and in turn become an individual.

I was exposed to this kind of advice while growing up. When I was younger, I would listen to my grandfather tell stories about his days in the Army. He would tell me fantastic stories of the time he spent as an MP in Germany and how he and his friends would race their motorcycles up and down the streets of town. He even told me the story of how he had met my grandmother in a small laundry over there. All of these stories made the Army seem so glorious, so exciting. I thought to myself, “Now there’s a life for me”. He was able to parlay his military career into a successful life back home, working as a pilot for the airlines. He lived the “American Dream”, rising from a poverty-stricken childhood in Hazard, Kentucky, to become a successful businessman and a powerful influence in Boone County and Northern Kentucky as a whole.

From an early age, I was groomed for the military academy. On Saturdays, we would go to the airport and go flying, and we would make our rounds to all of the different air shows and museums across the country. Needless to say, when I told him I’d decided that the military wasn’t for me, he was taken aback. All the time and energy we had put in to preparing me for the academy now seemed like I waste. I felt as though I was letting him down and that I was a disappointment in his eyes because of my choice. Then I realized something; I had been heading for the military for all the wrong reasons. It wasn’t something that I wanted to do, but rather something that I was doing to please him because I felt that I owed it to him somehow. I had allowed someone else to shape my life and make the decisions for me, instead of taking control myself. Because I hadn’t experienced the things that he had while growing up and  hadn’t been exposed to the same opportunities (or lack there of) that he had, the military was not the best choice for me. His advice was a source of great inspiration and information, but I had to learn for myself and make my own choices. I had to create my own identity and not relinquish this responsibility to someone else.

This is the point the Appiah stresses in his essay, The Ethics of Individuality. Appiah stresses that one’s identity should be created by that person alone and that no one else can choose who we are or who we become. Each and everyday we are pushed and pressured by our family, our friends, and the society in which we live. We are forced to conform to the different roles and expectations that  each has set out for us, but in the end it is up to us as individuals to make our choices. In his essay, Appiah referenced John Stuart Mill who, as a child, was molded by his father into his own image. He tried to plan his son’s life out for him, instead of giving his son the choices necessary to become a true individual. Mill then took control of his life, completely breaking the chains his father had used to bind and control his future. Appiah stressed that outside interference is the enemy of individualism. This, however, is only partly true. While it is important for us to make the decisions shaping our lives ourselves, we should consider the outside guidance and advice given to us by those with experience. We should learn from their mistakes, learn from their previous failures in order to help us grow and succeed. We should strive to make our own mark on society and leave our own print upon the world instead of completely modeling our lives off of another.

In today’s society, we are poked and prodded and molded by many different factors around us. We are continuously bombarded by outside influences trying to shape us into what they see fit. Robert F. Bennett said it best with his quote “If you can control the process of choosing, you can take control of all the aspects of life.”  If we take control of  our futures and assume the responsibility of making our life choices, we can  control our lives as a whole. Appiah too believed in this ideology. He believed that it should be left up to the individual to choose what path they will go down in life and that outside interference works against this process. While it is important for the individual to make their own decisions, we should all consider the advice given to us by our elders. More often than not, they have made the same mistakes that we are bound to make  and we can learn from these failures. We should, however, be cautious and not follow this advice blindly and therefore fail in our duty to take control of our own lives. In short, while it is important for us to make our own life decisions based off of our ideas, values, and experiences, we should consider the advice of those around us as both a source of guidance and inspiration.