Do you think that everything that happens to us is preordained? And I mean, like every little thing down to the seemingly random ones. The little choices we make, the ones we don’t make, the things we think have no effect on us, do you think that those random things have helped shape who you are?
Take, for instance, the last bus trip you took. I guess that the person that sat beside you was a total stranger and for the duration of the trip you guys didn’t speak to each other and you got off the bus never to see them again. This seems like a random moment in time with no consequence, right? But then, what if it turns out that you were supposed to sit beside that person even though they added nothing to your life? What if the balance of the world hung on the singular fact that you sat beside that stranger? What do you think would happen if you didn’t sit beside them?
You see, our lives are a series of tiny decisions that culminate into the big ones that end up changing our lives. Many people think that saying “yes” to their other half is one of the biggest decisions of their lives. But that decision never stands alone, there are about a hundred tiny decisions that carry that “yes” proudly and make you confident.
Imagine the first time ever you met your wife, what if some random thing happened? Maybe your bus was earlier or later than it should have been, maybe a passing car had splashed mud on your clothes, or maybe you were just in a terrible mood. How do you think these little changes would have affected what would come to be a beautiful relationship?
That’s why I’m asking again, are things preordained? Are we just puppets who go about as directed by fate because we have no choice in the matter? Is free will only an illusion because whatever happens, we’re only dancing to the tune that we’re played?
The truth is, we can never know. Every day we make tiny decisions that will one day prop up a big one. They’re all random and we don’t even know how they’ll affect our tomorrow. The stranger you sit down beside on the bus might not talk to you all through the trip, but something about him might inspire you to start up your own business. It might be so subtle, that you might not even realize that the stranger is responsible for the idea.
Now, the idea might not work out. Hell, it would be a total failure. But you won’t give up, you’d keep fighting and after several tries at several ideas, you finally land one that works and then you shoot off to the moon. By then, you’ve probably forgotten about that first idea that you got while on the bus and you’d definitely not remember the random stranger that sat down beside you. Now, what could have happened if the stranger didn’t sit beside you? Would you still have gotten that inspiration? Because from the looks of it, you and the stranger had to be on the same bus, on the same day, and at the same time for that inspiration to hit you. And that kickstarted the chain of events that led to the eventual success.
So, I’m asking again, are things preordained?
Because the more you think about it, the more likely it seems. Whether we like it or not, we’re kotowing to a higher power here. That’s why when you mess up pretty badly, you begin to think of the random things you could have done differently. “Maybe if you’d gone by bus instead of by car, you wouldn’t have gotten to work so early.” Or “If only you had gone out to smoke five minutes earlier or later, things would have been so much different.”
It can be scary to think about. Because the fact that things are preordained means that our thoughts and wills don’t matter. No matter what we want for ourselves, it’s the big picture that will always win in the end. That can make you want to give up and just let the big picture paint itself.
But then, what if that’s not all it’s about? What if nothing is preordained after all and everything is just one happy random act after another? What if we really have a say in what the big picture turns out to be? We are responsible for who we are and the decisions we make, just as we are going to reap the rewards or consequences of such decisions.
Personally, I don’t think anything in life is random. It may seem random but that doesn’t make it so. It’s just that humans are always so engrossed in themselves that they would never really stop to see the connections they could have to the stranger. Nothing is random, there’s a perfectly good explanation for everything. And if you take the time to find it out, you might get to understand the world you live in a little better.
But, we don’t have the time for all that, do we? We can’t be wasting time investigating every random act. So, we simply move on and continue with our lives. If it was meant to become important, it would. If not, we would never know because we’ve forgotten all about them.
That’s the beauty of random things.
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