Of course, you are right, you can really only help yourself, or choose to accept whatever help other individuals freely offer and use that to help yourself.

I like to think all my dangerous idealism was stomped out of me long ago. I guess it still flickers occasionally.

It is just as presumptuous for me to think I know who needs help and how to help them as it is for some government or NGO commissar to do so.

Probably, whatever you can do in your own backyard is all that can be done. Perhaps that’s enough, must be enough.

It’s just frustrating to see so many young people who don’t even know there are alternatives to the lifestyle they have been conditioned to think is normal, and sad to see so many people who think that because they didn’t win the prizes they saw on TV, they are failures forever.

But no one can be prepared for life. You just have to get out there and learn it by living it. Hopefully, you learn from your mistakes how to do what’s best for you. Luck never hurts either. Or thick skin. :)