Monday, February 18, 2008

You Don't Get to Choose Your Family

For better or worse, your family members are who they are.

For me, the reality is that we are related through blood, but we are also individual human beings who may not always agree on how we want to live. I have a relatively large family and most of us get along famously. I also have a few members of my family that I would rather not acknowledge as related to me. I know that sounds bad, but these individuals have made life choices that are completely out of my realm of reality.

Just like at work or in love, I have very strong ideas about the kind of energy I want in my life. It doesn't matter if you are related to me, if you are practicing unethical and/or illegal behavior, I don't want any part of it. I don't want it for me, my family, or my friends.

I have had lengthy conversations with people about this and the consensus is if someone is your family, you have to love and live with them no matter what. I simply do not agree. It makes me a little sad that I don't have the Leave it to Beaver family of the 1950s, but it is what it is, and I am making the best family I can for Dave and Mason.

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