“What would you change in your life if you could go back in time and change it?”

Starhawk’s answer is that he wouldn’t change anything. “I would never give up those experiences. Good or bad, right or wrong, it’s those experiences that have made me who I am.”

In my life, though there have been lots of key decisions, there was one major turning point. There was a point where a different decision would have guaranteed a completely different life path. A path where I wouldn’t have ended up in the Midwest. One where I wouldn’t have kids. At least not kids by the same woman. My life would have been fundamentally different in every way. This turning point was about 17 years ago.

But that is as far as I can see. I can’t see down that path to see if it would have been a better choice. Many times in the past 17 years I have assumed it would have. But there is no real way to know.

The things I do know.

I would never have met my wife. Or my kids. I would never have held my babies in my arms. Or ended up home schooling them.

I would not have discovered Ayn Rand and Objectivism. Which led me down a philosophical path that completely changed me as a person.

My current life path is not perfect. There are many changes that need to be made to improve quality of life and create happiness.

But I have to agree with Starhawk. I couldn’t give up this path. I worked to hard on this path to throw it all away.

Now, the premise of this question is obviously flawed. Even if I would go back in time to change things, I obviously couldn’t. There is no time travel.

This is it. Whatever life path you are on is the only one you have. But you are not stuck with it. Peter McWilliams said that everything you have done in your life up till this moment is nothing but a prelude in the book of your life; your story begins now.

You can change your life path. You can change where it is going in the future. You can throw it all away and try a different path. You can change it radically or desperately. Or you can modify your life path and change it for the better incrementally. Keeping what you have already built that is good and adding elements to your life that you need to improve it.

The trick is to not turn into a zombie and just stagger through your life unthinking. Letting the irreplaceable years drift by with no plan to improve your life. With no goals. That is the tragedy too easily seen all around. People who have given up.

I don’t believe acceptance is a virtue. It can have it’s time and place. But blanket acceptance is a cop out. It’s giving up.

Don’t give up. Never give up.