I’m saying virtually everything is within grasp for someone who wants better....
Throughout our lives our personal discipline gets challenged, at every corner. Whether it’s having an Angel on one shoulder and the Devil on the other shoulder, we are all faced with the options of immediate gratification or deferred gratification. Human free will doesn’t disappear just because some circumstances are tougher than others.
I went to a Catholic high school. My sophomore year we were playing a night game at Hanson Stadium, a Chicago public school stadium in Chicago. After we showered, we were supposed to sit in the visitor stands and watch the varsity play the next game. During the varsity game, a dozen teammates walked around the track to the far side to exit the stadium and get some booze, since some of them lived in that neighborhood. I walked with them. About 20 yards before the gate, I stopped and turned around. It wasn’t a moral decision, but it was a fear of getting caught, and the ramifications of that.
When we got back to our school, our AD Fr. King lined us all up and chewed our asses for about 30 minutes. We were all punished, and had to show up on Saturday (usually an off day after a game) and run for miles as punishment. But the dozen got it worse. They were kicked off the team.
Everything is a choice.
While everything is a choice, we are sometimes not in control of the outcome of those choices, which sometime are disparate.
I hooked school twice in my life. I got caught both times and didn't get to execute the second one, just barely made it out of the door before being caught by "The Colonel".
The first one, I was invited to hang out with "the cool kids" who would go to Mary's house. Crystal's mom thought her daughter was with us and demanded that we open the door to get her daughter. AFAIK, Crystal was an A-student.
Most of us were doing well in school, none were trouble makers, but it was a social class in our inner-city school with the bad reputation. Consequently because of that reputation, school administration, et al usually came down with both feet on any infractions. I also was made 2 years prior to serve a week's in-school suspension for (self-defense) fighting.
Back to the story: Crystal's mom was SERIOUS and somehow the cops were called. I recall running through an open field, moving around buildings and hiding in an effort to not get caught, while I was thinking about the possibility of losing any opportunity to apply to "The Academy" if I had an arrest record.
Somehow the names of those involved made it back to the Colonel and he exacted his form of discipline on us, which was merciful enough to not damage any of our futures. I'm sure it would have been different had the cops caught us or the school administration knows
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