To most people "The Way" refers to trip, a path, a route, a direction, a journey. Getting directions, shown the Map to go from one place to another. This is true.

To me a Way refers to how a person chooses to live their life. and The Way is what truly works. It is pretty obvious from experience that we all have some level of intelligence, emotions, knowledge and wisdom. We also have guidelines that we live our lives by. These are the results of our experience, mostly what we have learned from the people around us, or the books we've read combined with our emotional reactions to them.

Here is how life works: Throughout life we have decisions to make. As a result of each decision there are consequences, perhaps minor, perhaps major, for better or worse. Ultimately our situation in life is the accumulated consequences of our decisions. Yes, time and chance happens to all, and there are also differences in our starting points, our genetic makeup, our family history, our station in life. But these factors are minor compared to how well we handle both the good and bad situations that come our way by the decisions we make over a lifetime.

That is why a few people from the ghetto get wealthy, or famous or both, while the rest stay where they are. That is why immigrants can succeed while lottery winners lose their fortunes and become poorer than they ever were. Why some people end up in jail while others thrive. The accumulated choices we make ultimately determine the course of our lives.

That is why we only need two things to get on, and stay in the right track. Wisdom, and Strength.

Wisdom demands gathering information and experience. Seeking one or more mentors that live the way you want to live. Plus the strength to follow the path of someone you trust rather than letting your emotions and lack of experience make your choices for you. Learning to make choices the way those that have succeeded before you do, rather than just following your natural tendencies.

Learning how to gain knowledge and experience, use wisdom in the use of both by balancing properly your emotions and your intelligence, and gain experience while doing away with wrong habits and learning good ones, one decision at a time.

So ultimately I mean The Way as a metaphor for something even more important. The directions and information one needs to know and apply to walk successfully through one's life. One starts knowing nothing at birth, then as one gets older, one learns. But is what you learned truth? partial truth? or worse error? You need to know in order to move on from those humble beginnings and reach your full potential. Only when you are on that path can you be truly happy.

So how can we possibly know? Trial and Error? Paying Attention to History? Mankind has come up with several answers to this. Philosophy, Religion, Science, and more. But are they really answers? Look at the state of the world! These are certainly large fields with many conflicting lines of thought that would take a genius a lifetime to even start to understand them all. And then all you have is knowledge not implementation. Since they conflict with one another how can you possibly decide?

I believe that I've found the way to know. Unfortunately (or fortunately?) it is so simple that often people cannot accept it. It seems outrageous to many, and appears to defy logic at first look. It certainly flies in the face of most of the established lines of thinking in religion and philosophy. But if you walk just a short distance the facts start to line up, and the reinforcement in your own life become undeniable.