True to an extent, but to quote John Lennon, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans"

To a point.

If you are killed while still a baby, nothing you could do to improve your life. If you were born into an extreme poverty situation, deformed, sickly, blind, etc. your options for life improvement could be limited.

But for most people, that's often true.

There are things in life that are beyond our control.

True. Perception is the only reality.

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.”

• Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

Life is what it is. What you make of it is your decision. In other words, life can hand you a pale of crap and it's up to you to decide how you respond to it.

"Life is what you make it." Not an axiom but more of a call to arms. It reminds you to take stock of your agency.

Its all about acceptance... that's hard saying I'm ok with a birth defect. Or I lost my leg from an accident and be happy. Happy is the hard part... but as you say.... it's how you own it that effects you.

Yes I’d say it’s true for the most part unless you were dealt an extremely bad deck of cards then it might be very differcult.

The universe is chaos with pockets of order, but chaos lies within the order. The chaos permeates all of the universe, no matter the scale. This chaos makes your life.

Both! It's true for many to a large degree. However, circumstances you are born into have a huge impact on this. Yes, many people have it within their power to overcome adversity in their lives. But some are just born in the wrong place at the wrong time and are in an environment they have no nope of defeating and no way to improve their situation. In the US and in most "free" countries, I believe most people DO have it within their power.

Absolutely true. Life is a cosmic accident, completely random and entirely without purpose or meaning outside of what you determine to make of it. That sounds bleak but if you consider the details it's actually liberating. We are all comprised of stardust, the matter we are made from is billions of years old. We are self replicating particles combined into a single unique consciousness that is as far as we can tell the only self aware thing on this planet. The sheer accident of your existence is in itself a greater miracle than any divine creator could actually perform.

Absolutely, because the One thing ( the ONLY thing!) in your power is chosing the way you react to events...you can let them overwhelm you, or you can cope & rise above!

It you do not believe you have the power to make your existence different, then you are not really living. So be it for the positive, or negative view of your statement, I believe it to be true. You are either trying to make it better, or leaving it the same. Both approaches show that life is indeed what you make it.

I never complained for not being born in a rich house, or born to married parents or for being raised by my grandmother.... to me all being a plus.... even my only Living Hero.... the singer/songwriter named Rodriguez, unknown to many americans while being a superstar in distant countries said the phrase I live by.... "Nothing Beats Reality". I LIVE, I AM WHAT MY LIFE IS. If I don't like the odds against me is up to me to change the damned odds instead of complaining the odds or accepting the odds. Every now and then somebody ask me the question... Why you are not rich? My answer all my life being the same... I had never tried to be rich, never been of my interest but what I was interested on... I became a master and an overachiever and that is how I always seen the game of life. You Make Your Own Fortune. I am not talking money. Example EX GF complained she lost at least 5,000 to 10,000 on the stock market this week. I gave her a Blank Stare. She knows it means I am Not interested, I will be supported as friends we are but I am not a player in the game so my simpathy is without much value... I did told her... When you make that money back will you share it with me? Or you only share with me your loses... she gave me a blank stare. He, he, he, he.

False because the natural order can fuck it up.

Life has a lot of externalities, variables that really aren't of your making and even when we make choices we don't always know or choose what influenced us to make them.

Very true, you have to get used to alot of disappointment in life, and also cherish the good and great things you have

well I think that the bits you can make of it are important - for instance putting in a lot of work to get a good degree ,and like any job, with living, there are 'unforseen's'
that crop up - Like if youre in a motorway pile up that just happened as a fog came down or in a train crash or stuck in a lift with a mormon - some things you just have to get through but I think a positive can do attitude helps for the first bit.

You are the sum of the choices you make. Choices can change your circumstances and make your life better. Every time my life has improved it is the results of choices I have made.

Pretty much. But there is always chaos.

It's partly true I'd say. The world objectively does suck with all its problems. And with this knowledge you might find yourself feeling like these weren't the times you wish you were born into. But as Gandalf said 'that is not for you to decide. All you have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to you.'

That saying is a lot like the bible. There's a little bit of truth to it, but the laws we inherited from our ancestors restrict our rationality allowing some of our truths to be false.

True

Would not have it any other way . Is it possible to hide a false life from yourself?. I suppose some do try, but then they are delusional .