Predestination

Fate and Destiny are probably two of the most enamoring terms in the world right now. People who do not believe in them seem to be more interested than the ones who do, simply because of the reason that they might be waiting to experience them by (not) achieving what they’ve always wanted in life and call it their Predestination. Predestination basically addresses the concept of destiny or fate which means being determined in advance; especially the school of thought that God has foreordained every event throughout eternity.


The last time I remember myself thinking about my destiny was when I scored low in my examinations despite of the fact that I had worked really hard. “Maybe my destiny”, I thought to myself, disregarding the fact that maybe a little more of that ‘hard work’ could have done the trick. This very situation could have conjured many different reactions from me. Had I succeeded in achieving what I wanted, I would have said to myself, “I worked hard and scored well, hence I am shaping up my destiny pretty well”. I could have used it as a means of displaying my modesty too,”I did not do anything, maybe it was in my destiny to do well, that’s it.” Had the result gone the other way, “maybe my destiny, hence I did not score well”. Garbled? Yes, I think so. As for me, I haven’t really experienced the ‘shaping up my destiny’ part that often in my life, so at times I use it as a means to hide my failures from myself.


Predestination, as a concept, has had me mystified for quite a long time now. I have wondered if it really does exist or not. My inclination has been towards the view that it does exist irrespective of the way in which we comprehend it. There would be many who wouldn’t agree with the thought. They would believe in the reasoning that if you have done it, it becomes your destiny (if you really want to give it a name, that is) and not that it is your destiny, which is why you have done it. I am not going to speak against the view in any which way, because this very view might have kept them going in their life, and we all should respect that.


Since we are talking over the concept of determining the events that could affect our destiny to a reasonable extent in ‘advance’, getting attracted to the subject even if we don’t believe in it seems pretty normal. There was a time when I used to deny the fact that any of the predictions about the events slated to happen in our lives and be ‘called’ our destiny can be true. Nevertheless, I used to get attracted to the whole construct and the ways by which various practitioners recite to their clients their fate by the all interesting names like face reading, palm reading etc. but my state of denial started transforming into a ‘confused’ one when I started encountering the stages of my life that had been predicted and which I earlier thought can only be ‘pure coincidences’.


Now, I have encountered a number of people who are firm believers of each and every word the prediction of their destiny. Sometimes people tend to take their predicted destiny to be word by word true the moment they hear it and start living their lives relying solely on that, which can pose serious problems in their lives. For example, I’m told by a practitioner that my destiny holds for me studies which cannot be termed even half of what we call average. Now, if I am a firm believer of the view that, since it is not my destiny, it will not happen, then these few words are more than enough to make me believe that I cannot do it. In the end, if I don’t believe that I can do it, then it cannot be done by any stretch of imagination and then whatever happens in our lives is in accordance with the predicted destiny which in turn will make us believe the line “my destiny, hence…”.


Most of us do not take it to be entirely true. We still want to believe that our ‘destiny’ has a lot more surprises in store for us or rather, WE have a lot more surprises in store for our destiny.