Caught Between Two Choices

Navigating the Tug-of-War of Decision Making

"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."

Thoreau

In life, we are faced with many decisions most of which are trivial such as what should I eat tonight or what clothes should I put on today but every now and again you have to make decisions that will affect your life forever.

I made one of those decisions 15 years ago when I was 19.

I had the choice between joining the company my best friend worked at and still does or get on a train and head south to Lympstone at the bottom of the U.K. The place where the longest basic military training in the world takes place. The Royal Marines Commando Training.

I come from a working-class family. Me and my brother never went without but we weren’t by any means flush with money. My mum could spend every penny in the world if it was in her hands, my dad, the more frugal of the two never wanted to borrow money. You earned it, saved it and then spent it.

I respected my parents but it was with my friends that I learned to grow up in a rough area of North Manchester. I wasn’t brave or courageous. I was just a normal kid who blended in and didn’t stand out in any way whatsoever.

But that decision to jump on that train changed my life. I was suddenly immersed in a world so far from what I was accustomed to it was untrue. But from that day to 6 years later when I left I was a different person and still am today thanks to that decision.

That decision laid the foundation for the drive and ambition I have today.

At times, however, it can feel like it’s a hindrance more than a superpower and I still don’t resemble anything like my friends in that sense. All of my friends are seemingly comfortable. The jobs are chosen for them by other people to make them money, in a routine that’s set by somebody else. Akin to a puppet master pulling their strings with only weekends to really do as they please.

To be clear I’m really happy, (probably the happiest I’ve ever been) with where I am right now in life, I’m a co-owner of a construction business, happily married and have a house that me and my wife have ripped apart and put back together, transporting it back to its original time and magnificence. Well nearly!

But I can’t help but feel unsettled. To go where and in which direction I do not know. I have a yearning to find that place. I hope that when I am there, there are people like me. People searching, creating, poking, prodding, doing!

For now, it seems like a solo mission but in my mid-twenties I started, ever so slowly to pick up books. That habit has transformed the way I think. It was another decision, this time less obvious that changed my life. Over the last couple of years, I’ve taken it more seriously and set up a proper reading routine but it’s helped with the isolation. I’m by no means a hermit, I have a great social life and work also allows me to socialise a lot too. I’m going to France next week on a work trip. Fantastic!

But by reading books by authors like Nassim Taleb, Naval Ravikant, Seneca, Phil Knight (Nike), Ray Dalio, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, and Jeff Bezos you get to immerse yourself in their world.

I’m not sure where I’m heading but I know that within those books I’ll find an answer. Even if it’s peace. Perhaps I’m a lost soul. I have something familiar with our ancestors in that I want to roam. To where I do not know but I suspect a lot of time neither did they. They roamed to where they needed to be. They knew they needed to be there when they were there and not a second beforehand.

This newsletter aims to take sections from books by people similar to those above and to try to explain how you and I can use their sage advice in our lives. I’ve been slightly sidetracked doing that the last few days and I’m not sure how this may help anybody but I have these dreams. They’re always with the same people but always different.

When I was in the Marines I was based in Scotland and I went up there with a few lads I passed out in training with. We were inseparable. They were my best mates and I thought it would be that way forever. After a few years, one of them got a draft down on the English South Coast, then another one somewhere else until there was just me. I’d allowed myself to remain idle. I stopped wanting to move forward and instead hoped I could mark time.

I dream about those lads all the time. And it’s always the same in the sense that they’re doing something I can not or that I’m fumbling around trying to catch up to them or I’m trying to fight them. I read something the other day by Naval Ravikant that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about and triggered another one of them dreams last night. He said:

"Do you want to leave your friends behind? Or be the one left behind?"

Naval Ravikant

It’s pretty blunt advice but from my experience it’s true. Nothing lasts forever, good or bad thankfully. My wife and I nearly moved to Texas last year. Well, we at least started towards doing it but we love our families and I’m particularly close to hers. The company I co-own is her father’s and he’s passed it down to me and another lad middle of last year now that he’s retiring. It was a choice I had to make also and I put Texas on the back burner. But that nagging feeling. That wanting to roam, to explore is burning inside of me like a fire I can’t put out. My wife is the same. How on Earth am I going to figure this one out?

I wish there was something actionable here. Something logical I could lay out that what show me. I prefer logic. It feels concrete to me because it makes sense. I struggle with emotions, with deciding between two things I desperately want but know I can’t have.

But I’ve done this before. I did it 15 years ago when faced with chasing a dream or remaining idle. And again when I was left behind by my mates in their pursuit of their careers. My dreams are perhaps reminding me, pushing me forward and in the right direction. I suspect I already know the answer. I just need logic. I just need it to make sense to me.

"You better make sense of what happened to other people in other times and other places because if you don't you won't know if these things can happen to you and, if they do, you won't know how to deal with them."

Ray Dalio, Principles

Photo by Josh Sorenson