DESTINY & FREE WILL

RANDOM MORNING THOUGHTS

“The course of her life has led to this”, a phrase that came to mind in one of those rare events when my thinking actually paused for a moment during a time of stressful struggle.

My mother was dying from cancer. I was at the rail in an Episcopal church at 3 AM on Maundy Thursday. I was a regular church goer then, but not now.

I was praying, “Why. What can be done?” My thinking became exhausted. For just a moment my mind was silent, and those words came clearly to mind, not of my thinking. That given statement has prompted more thinking since.

“The course of her life …”; what does that mean? Was this destined or was some degree of free will involved? Do we have free will, or is everything destined, or is everything random, by chance?

I have since hypothesized, subject to any new credible evidence, that our lives are a mysterious blend of both destiny and free will that determine our course.

Looking back across my 87+ years I think I see elements of both destiny and free will. I hypothesize destiny applies more to what happens to us, and free will applies to how we react to it. I suspicion it is not that simple, but it generally works for me for now.

Too simple? For instance, free will decisions in our past may influence what happens to us now. With some thought, it seems that our free will choices play some role in determining our future destiny.