The paths we could have taken and could still take are infinite. All our actions are interdependent. Nothing is independent.
My Dad was in India in 1936 and went swimming off the troopship but got caught in a swift current which would have swept him into the delta and certain death. He desperately grabbed at a mooring rope as he passed along the hull and said the pull almost tore his arms from his body but he managed to hold on until safely recovered. Had it not been for that rope I would not be here!
'Find your enemy and shoot him down - everything else is unimportant.'