I’m writing this on Friday, right after Thanksgiving, as my brother-in-law and best friend, who came for dinner and stayed the night, have now returned home. After he got there, my friend called me to talk and let me know he made it home safely, as apparently, my brother-in-law, who drove up, drives like a maniac.

So it got around to talking about his money problems, especially the fact that, he’s blaming his bank for not taking the mortgage money on time, and by the time they do, he’s already spent it.

Yeah, that’s not a good way to live life.

It came up that we could pay his mortgage off, entirely, out of what we just have sitting in our checking account right now. He only owes 30-40k principle and that’s not a big deal for me. It is for him.

Now, why am I saying this? Couldn’t I just help him out? He even says not to because there’s no guarantee he’d ever pay us back. It’s not that. It’s the fact that, for the past 40 years that I’ve known him, and the past 35 or so that she has, we have both given him advice on what he ought to do to live a responsible life and he has, without exception, listened and done the exact opposite.

It’s why my wife and I are financially set for the rest of our lives and he… isn’t.

He admits that he’s made a lot of mistakes. He’s admitted that for 40 years now. Yet every single time that we tell him what he ought to do, what has worked for us, he has done the opposite, even after we tell him that he’s going to screw up again and he does it anyhow. He does not want to change, and now, that he’s in his mid 50s and sitting on a mountain of debt, struggling to make ends meet, he is still making the same mistakes over and over and over. There are some people you just can’t help.

Could we bail him out? Sure. Easily. Yet it wouldn’t really be helping, would it? If he got into a bind he couldn’t get out of, we’d be happy to step in, but he wouldn’t learn anything. He wouldn’t actually be responsible. That’s what people have to be. Responsible.

I bring that up only because I see so many people doing the same thing and making the same mistakes. Responsibility starts at the very beginning. You don’t say “I’ll be responsible when I turn 30” or “when I turn 40”, you have to do it now.

Yes, I understand a lot of people had crappy parents, which is sad in and of itself, but that’s not really an excuse. I see a lot of people making excuses, as my friend does, for why they aren’t where they want to be. It’s everyone’s fault but their own.

Except it’s not.

Sure, there can be things that happen to you for which you are not directly to blame. Big deal. You still have to deal with it as an adult. Adapt and move forward. Welcome to the real world.

My life hasn’t all been sunshine and roses, but I still made it through. I am not where I always thought I’d be, but through hard work and dedication, I still made a good life for myself and my family and at the end of the day, that’s all that matters. I didn’t have anyone throwing money at me when I screwed up, when I made mistakes, and I’ve made my fair share, it was on my shoulders to fix it and I did. Others can too.

Yet we live in a society where everyone is so busy blaming everyone else that nothing really gets done. They don’t fix their mistakes because they can’t acknowledge that they’ve made any, It’s just a series of unfortunate circumstances, for which they bear no responsibility, and it’s someone else’s job to come along and bail them out because… well, who knows?

The real reason is that most people these days are lazy. Perhaps that’s always been true for some, but the ones who rise to the top, those are the ones who got off their backsides and worked their asses off for years and years at thankless jobs, who scrimped and sacrificed until they were at a point in their lives where they had more latitude and could exercise more control. Of course, by then, they had to have learned a lot of good life lessons, which is how they got to that point in the first place.

So why can’t a lot of people do that? I honestly don’t know.

It starts when you’re young, getting an education. Yes, there is a lot to be said for parental support, but tons of kids would rather remain stupid than think about their futures. Regardless, if you don’t get an education, you fail. Check yourself into a morgue right now if you didn’t learn how to live a decent life. It can be picked up later in life, but it’s much harder. Watching kids drifting through life, getting drunk and high rather than learning anything, that’s just a recipe for disaster.

Then comes getting a job. Get one. Don’t wait until you are out of college. Get one now and work your butt off. It matters. The time for being a child ends when you’re about 13. It’s not when you’re 26. Grow up. It’s not a suggestion, it’s a requirement.

I’ve always said that there are four requirements to being a serviceable adult. Get an education. Get a job. Make responsible decisions and be personally responsible for yourself. Stop acting like a 4-year old and learn some maturity. If you can do those things, you’re 90% of the way there. Far too many people these days can’t, or won’t do any of it. They are fill of excuses for why they don’t want to be adults. They don’t want to be responsible. Then, when they’re 60 and eating cat food, they’re looking to blame society for their failures. No, it’s you. You did that to yourself. You are almost entirely to blame. Just because things didn’t go your way, that’s not an excuse. You have to deal with the world as it is and if life gives you lemons, you’d damn well better find a way to make lemon pie. My friend is living through that failure now. I’m happy to help if he really needs it, but he knows that he screwed up. He’s now going to have to live with the consequences of those failures.

Don’t be like him.