I sometimes feel like my life has been a series of battles… that or one continuous war. Regardless, I can look back on my life and see where there were pivotal moments, whether the battle was being fought from within or with an outside party, where it was important for me to stand and fight. There are still those continuing battles, I can think of three at the moment, which I will explain shortly. It is important to stand and fight for two reasons:
- It is important for me to not allow myself or others to do things that are detrimental to me as a person and my soul. I deserve better. I have a voice. I am worthy of receiving what I deserve and being treated fairly. When I allow someone to take advantage of me or if it is me not being kind to myself, then I erode myself, my being, my willpower. I ultimately become a doormat in the end. That is not good for me.
- It is important for me to have boundaries and let others know when they have crossed those boundaries. It is important that they know I am not a doormat. I am not their doormat. They need to understand that if they impinge on my rights or boundaries that there will be consequences. This is important for me to exist in a world with others.
Right now I have a few situations where I feel like others are trying to take advantage of me and get away with it or get over on me. I take great care of my yard. It is a point of pride. It is something I can beautify and control. It is my little garden or sanctum. Well, the power company and one of their contractor’s just rolled through recently and cut an L shaped gap through all my front trees which are quite mature and would take tens of thousands of dollars to replace. They gave not notice, which is the custom, they just did it. Perhaps I would have chosen to bury the lines, perhaps I would have worked out a different compromise. Now there is an easement but still, there should have been a choice given to me as the landowner. There wasn’t. Well, this could be a big fight, but one I feel is necessary to engage in. They should do business a better way, a more neighborly way. They need to be held accountable. Furthermore, I shouldn’t just have to eat it. That just isn’t fair to them or me. So, I will take steps to make the situation more equitable. I will take action. If I don’t, I will suffer, others will suffer the same fate, and ultimately, the power company and their contractors will suffer from their lack of accountability and by continuing to treat customers badly.
My second situation is with a former owner of a building that I bought where it has a plumbing issue which was not disclosed. This is something that the former owner knew about but didn’t tell us about. My partners and I are now left to deal with the fix which costs money. The seller should be held accountable. For me to not take action and just take this one on the chin would be wrong for me and would not teach any lesson for accountability to the seller. I will take action.
My third current situation is a renter of a residential unit I have that is trying to stay and not pay rent. He was a good renter for a while but now has stopped paying. Well, I still must pay the mortgage on that unit. I have served him a “Notice to Quit” notifying him I will evict if he doesn’t pay and/or leave. To take no action would put me and my family in a bad position. Plus, it would do nothing for him but create a windfall where he gets to take advantage of me. I am taking action.
I am a student of life here in earth school (credit to Bob Demers), we all are. I feel like life presents us with these and other challenges all the time. Many times we do nothing. We take it. We become used to taking it and not taking action because of these situations. Then in the end we become pushovers. I am an estate planning and elder law attorney and I see this all the time. People believe that they just can’t qualify for a benefit to pay for long-term care even though they paid for that benefit with taxes all their lives. They believe that they have no control anymore, even though they were born with the ability to take any action and exercise control over every situation and in turn their lives in general. They don’t know or believe that they can create a plan to avoid excessive taxation and leave a legacy to their loved ones. They don’t take action to set in place agents to handle financial affairs and healthcare affairs during their lives.
Whether you agree with my battles I am fighting or not is irrelevant. These are my battles, not yours, and I will fight them. It is important to me to fight them. What is important for you is to exercise your power and control over your life and its situations. I have devoted my entire professional life to helping others fight their battels, control their lives, minimize tax consequences, and protect and control their assets throughout their lives and beyond. They key here is taking action. That is your decision. The most important part of any situation for me is taking action and not being a victim. Being a victim is essentially a choice. The lack of action is a choice. I choose to act and I hope you do as well. I would be glad to help you and your family take action to square away your estate planning affairs. I would offer a FREE consultation to you and your family to lay out an action plan. Give us a call or schedule online today.
Greg McIntyre
Estate Planning & Elder Law Attorney
