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Life Is Earned, Never Given

Why the struggles you face in life reflect your choices

George Kalantzis
5 min readOct 22, 2021
Photo by Hannah Skelly on Unsplash

I am flowing with the concepts from my book Nowhere To Go

You never know the level of strength and courage you have inside until you have something greater than yourself to fight for.

The day I stepped on the yellow footprints at Marine Corps Paris Island was one of the most defining moments in my life. With my fists clenched and my thumbs along my pant seams, spit came across my forehead as a drill instructor yelled at me to lock my body. For the next ninety-six hours, the only words I spoke were “yes sir, no sir, and aye-aye sir.”

As I quickly walked through two large silver doors, the drill instructor in front of us yelled, “You can only pass through these doors once in your life! Thereafter, you must enter and exit from a different door.”

When those large silver hatches closed behind me, one chapter of my life ended, and so too, did another one begin.

That passage represents a recruit’s official entrance into becoming a Marine. No one else walks through those large silver doors. It’s a tradition and a commitment to accept the challenge in a collective effort to rise to something greater. The result is becoming part of an elite breed of humans fueled by a common bond like no…

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George Kalantzis
George Kalantzis

Written by George Kalantzis

George is a professional storyteller, a dad to a sassy and adventurous eight year-old girl, and the author Of Nowhere To Go

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