TL;DR The path to greatness is through a minefield, up a mountain, it is not merely staying on a straight and narrow path, I would like to discuss the effects of marriage and children on a man's career and purpose.

Many great men who have resigned themselves to a higher purpose, greater that marriage and kids, have been bogged down with the responsiblilty of children and marriage, these men often have faced the true nature of women and have chosen to walk their own path but have been leveraged into an impossible position by a woman. The shock of a unexpected child puts a man in a precarious situation, he is faced with two options and the fork in the road may be the biggest decision in his life even though he may not have a say in the matter.

The Alpha-male, the ambitious, able and willing man, the force which has driven human progress for centuries, inevitably seeks the warmth of a woman but due to his unwavering resolve in his purpose, he is unwilling to commit to said woman. This is a problem for a woman and she has tools which can make the strongest man kneel in defeat, I will now explore the stories of three men whom I work with in a boiler making workshop (over the holidays as I am a student).

Daniel, the spec ops welder. Daniel went straight into the Air-Force after school and immediately excelled as a specialist, he went on to climb the ranks and eventually received his operators badge and was classified as the eternal bad ass all South Africans know of, a RECCE, the best of the best, and went on to become a respected career soldier, he was deployed as a UN peacekeeper in the congo, CAR, Somalia, Sierra Leone and a few more he was involved in the 2006 Congo presidential palace offensive and many more campaigns and has vast experience hunting rebels and pirates, You know what happens next... girlfriend back home gets pregnant (under dubious circumstances as he was deployed so often), she threatens to take his kids away from him if he doesn't settle, he quits the military and retires a flight sergeant, now he works as a untrained welder as the SA economy is bad and its all he can get, he is stoic and reserved, his eyes tell a story of lost ambition and sacrifice.

Vincent the hot shot corporate wolf foreman. Vincent, at age 29 is a self made man, he was a rep of a company that finances deals in grains futures contracts between countries, he makes a lot of money he also travels a LOT, he is never in the same place for long, his career depends on this, he is the most alpha man I have ever met, he is a bastion of integrity, His girlfriend becomes pregnant and she forces him to settle, after job hunting in the barren South African job market to no avail he now manages the workshop, it is a decent job but nothing compared to what he had, money is ok. Word going around is that girlfriend faked pregnancy test and then really got knocked up after the fact.

Patrice, the immigrant slave. Patrice does not have a life purpose, the Zimbabwean economy has collapsed and he has come to South Africa for work, he is a beast of burden, he is a Zimbabwean immigrant and cannot bring his wife and three daughters with him to SA as violent xenophobia is a pressing concern, he works like a slave and scrapes up all the overtime he can to send the money back to Zimbabwe, he works multiple jobs 6 Days a week, he faces the violent and brutal nature of xenophobia regularly and is often beat up by gangs (South Africans think that the Zimbabweans are taking their jobs), I have heard that he always wanted to be a teacher in Zimbabwe but this is completely out of the question, he wouldn't even have enough money to feed himself.

Lessons learned There is one way to the top and you have to make your own way, but there are many ways down, be weary of a woman's nearsighted ambitions to lock you down, she probably doesn't care about your happiness or spiritual well being, the only thing that a great man loves cares about other than his purpose in life is usually his children and she will use this against you, of course this is nothing new, don't get married and wrap it up, get a vasectomy if necessary and don't step on a landmine with red lipstick and blonde locks