Do you think people are more shaped by their choices or their circumstances?

[Nikki1989]

Updates

2 mo

Choices you make will ultimately put you on the right road or the wrong one.

[LiamJHayden]

Tough one. Choice can shape circumstances, and circumstance can dictate available choices. In my case, circumsances. I would not have gotten nearly as far as I have at this age without the huge head start that came from my parents and grandparents.

[loveslongnails]

Choices. You can choose to get out of your circumstances, it's just often really difficult.

[loveslongnails]

Thank you Nikki.

[Simslover92]

This is a hard question to answer because there are people who live rough lives and in rough neighborhoods that don't really have a choice in how their life is led for the most part, but there is always a choice in how you come out of that hardship. Some of the poorest people have been able to become successful over time and turn things around, so I am on the verge of saying we are shaped more by our choices than our circumstances.

Personally, I come from a poor background and even though I am not as successful as I would like to be, I am proud to say I have a roof over my head and have never gone without the lights turning off like my mother did because I made a choice to be better and do better than she did.

[Nikki1989]

Sometimes it seems people from poorer upbringings wind up being the strongest.

[Simslover92]

That's so true. They do.

[MrChinaski]

Mostly, kids needs stability.

My father grew up dirt poor on a farm picking peas Christmas mornings. Died with a number of million dollars.

Was that choice? Of course. He had a vision for a better life and he chose it.

But there is a big difference between growing up in stable poverty and growing up being kicked out of rentals, having four half-siblings by different fathers and meth users down the alley.

Circumstances matter little, but when they do they matter a lot. There's a whole literature on stable attachment that relates.

[NathanDavis]

probably... the circumstances, might play a more substantial role

even when you have a choice and make your own... you could still be pushed into making one, by the circumstances...

[Just_Ken]

Statistics can be used to make any point, 80% of people know this.

[Bricealan]

@Nikki1989 Nikki, I think our Choices create our circumstances

[Bricealan]

@Nikki1989 choices may be limited by where, when, and under what circumstances you were born

[AngryCarl3]

Circumstances. You can make all the right choices and still get a bad result.

[thegreenyogi]

As for me... a bit of both.

[jimbob70]

Choices

[eagle1951]

choices

[fuddly]

Yes completely agree