Ok, let me see if I have this right. I pick a born option village born, city born, noble born whatever take the bonus', skills and stats from that path. There are say 3 leads on that path and you then choose one of those as your next path. For example you choose village born and it says soldier and one of those options I can then choose anything under the professional soldier lifepath without a penalty unless it has other restrictions. For example you couldn't jump from village born as a 6 year old and take Captain of the guard or Knight, you would have to meet certain restrictions from there. However if you are say village born and you want to take a path that is not in your leads like faith or sorcery you can do so as long as you pay a 1 year penalty and don't choose one of the sub headings with pre-requisits.
Example: I want to play a bastard who becomes a squire. His knight is killed in a battle and he is left with no options and becomes a mercenary. I want him to view fighting and death as a job. But I want him to be repulsed by sadistic people who take joy in hurting others. I would also give him the belief once bought stays bought. If I remember correctly I could take the paths: Noble Born, Bastard, Squire, seargeant. How do I work in the defeat where he looses his knight and goes merc? I would also like to give him a leg wound so he has limited movement but his hand eye coordination would be fine.