Destiny

A friend of mine mentioned recently his thoughts on how his destiny is predetermined and how there is nothing in his life that he could do to change it. This view of life upsets and distubs me in ways. Living one's life this way pretty much destroys everything that I stand for. It makes one believe that nothing can be left up to chance. Nothing can be left up to discovery. Nothing can be left up to choice, which is ultimately where I have problems with this idealogy. My whole life I was basically told that my life is to be decided by a series of choices. The choices would be mine and would be difficult at times, but I would have the freedom to choose.

I leave a lot of my life up to chance. There's a lot to be said about destiny and fate. Star Wars talks about it all the time. Destiny is a tricky thing to figure out. It's not alwasy easy. People aren't born with it. They might not get it until they become teenagers. They might not get it until they finally sign those divorce papers. They might not get it until they are on their deathbed. They might not even get a chance to get it at all. But no matter whether you're born with it or not or if you get it or not, you can't run or hide from it. It will always be there right on your tail ready for you once you accept it.

Last weekend, I ate at a Chinese restaurant and received a fortune from my fortune cookie that read, "Your destiny is to become famous." And now that I've spilled that secret it's probably destined not to come true. But as were my intentions at the time, the fortune seemed very apt and thrilled me to no end. My intentions until Friday, June 3, at about 5:00pm in the evening were to travel to New York and try to "make it" in the music business, or at least get a start at it. But as I was making my preparations to get away from Quincy once again, I felt a kind of tug at my arm that was not allowing me to leave. Was my destiny wrong? Had I not figured it out yet? Did the cookie lie to me? (Note: cookies have never lied to me before and have most of the time been quite delicious.) But whatever it was, it kept me from leaving and it made me realize that my destiny has not been decided yet. I get to choose it, and I can advance it or postpone it as I see fit. I can even change it altogether if I want. One thing we all learned from Star Wars is that we can change our destinies even at the very last minute. I do see myself in New York at some point in the future, and I can control that. And whether the fortune from the cookie is right or not, I will not find out until I get there. And even if and when I do get there, I'll still be in control of my destiny. I am holding my own life in my own hands. I have nothing to worry about. Or I have only it to worry about.