The Un-fated Freewill

These quotes from Viveknanda and Ralph Waldo Emerson explain in a few words what all there is to be understood about the phenomenon of freewill:

“The will is not free - it is a phenomenon bound by cause and effect - but there is something behind the will which is free.” (VN)

“ Fate is nothing but the deeds committed in a prior state of existence.” (RWE)

The mystery of existence is the mother of the fate or freewill quandary. To understand the daughter, we must first understand the mother. But, for the sake of confusion (read clarity) let’s try to understand both simultaneously.

There are all types of people in this world: those who believe in fate and those who have chosen to be free of fate by choosing freewill. There is another set of people too, that has found a middle path. This group believes that the main events are the fated milestones in the journey of life, but how we reach each milestone is under our control. My belief swings between “only fate” to “both fate and freewill”. Certainly my belief is tilted toward the middle path.


Why Don’t We Have Freewill to Change the Physical Events?

I have started watching The Hero season 1 again. So the question why can’t we change our future (read physical events) in real life enjoys the hot seat on the top most layer of my conscious mind. This morning, just before reaching the office, the thought that this question itself is unfounded oiled my mind.

Consider this: the world is a stage and we are its actors. The scriptwriter and director is, of course, God. Therefore, we are just acting upon his script and following his directions. Sounds clichéd?

God doesn’t give each of us much leeway because we are egoistic beings. So let’s say if he gives me the leeway to change the physical events in my life, I’d inevitably change the permutation and combinations (energy and matter) such that my actions will disturb the plans of those connected with me directly or indirectly. As a corollary effect, the plans of others who are connected with those whose life I have affected will also be disturbed. Moreover, if I have the power and the leeway, others have it too, which means there will be a collision of power, freedom, energy, matter. This collision will not let the world function the way it is designed to function. Point to be internalized is, each and every thing and being is intricately entwined, and therefore change in one leads to change in the other.

God is perfect. He is absolute genius. He created a perfect situation: egoistic beings who want everything their way, but no freewill—not in the way (acausal) we would want to exploit it. He created angels and demons, he created night and day, he created deserts and oceans, and he created barren and fertile lands. His game plan is clear. He wants the opposites to first fight, then unites, and finally become absolute. The power and freedom to change the physical events acausally would have destroyed his world not long after he created it. So he laid out rules: cause and effect, action and result. Whether we realize it or not, the world despite all the violence and environmental imbalances, is in perfect balance. We have both murderers and healers…

( I’m not sure how acausal synchronicity is. Jung’s notion of synchronicity is that there is an acausal principle that links events that have a similar meaning, by their coincidence in time rather than sequentially. I’d rather remove “a” from acausal and call it the casual principle of sychronicity. The similarity of meanings between two or more events creates the cause for a sychronicity to happen. Doesn’t it?)

Why Is the Question of Freewill Unfounded?

Why do we need freewill? To change something in our lives isn’t? Why do we want to change things? Is it not because we are unhappy with their current state? Why don’t we like life as it is? Why do we not understand that things are the way they should be? This is because we have divided everything into good and bad, right and wrong, pain and happiness. If we strip our minds of these categorizations, there will no longer be any need to change things, and therefore, we will not want the freewill to change events. Elimination of categories and divisions will bring a divinely harmonious order into this world. Consequentially, the question of freewill won’t arise at all.