Destiny or Free Will: Reflections on Life’s Journey

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Destiny or Free Will: The Journey is Thrilling

By: R.S. Mooshahary

We come to this world without our asking for it; we neither know how long we will be around here. From here when the time comes
to go, we do not know where we are going. This is a journey we will not possibly remember at all after we have completed it �
maybe the journey itself never completes. The experience between our arrival and departure � the bivouac in this world � is
what we call life. Are we here for merely following the course of events that is already charted for us or we have some choice
to decide where we go in this life? This is a question which no one can answer with empirical certitude because no one returns
to tell us the beyond-the-life tale.

Science, philosophy, metaphysics, religion and all other human fields of knowledge are still groping for an answer to this
mystery � whether we are drawing our own pattern of events or merely copying what has already been encrypted in the pages of
destiny for each one of us. Is there free will to reach where we want to? Well, both the believers and non-believers have their
own responses to this question. They may not agree but they both do not know the truth. In other words, what they claim to know
is not the truth. Religion, of course, is more obstinate and it will not admit that it is beyond it while science will say that
it is still in pursuit of this mystery and one day it will find out the truth. Maybe one day it will, by creating life itself
in the laboratory and unraveling, through the DNA etched in every life form, the crucial question of that matter that guides
life � its past, present and future.

We have no choice in our birth and death and that prompts us to think that we have no choice in determining our course of life
as well. This will be an extreme fatalist view of life and it is likely to rob life of the charm of existential challenges and
expanding our quest for the mysteries of nature. There is a story of a man who believes that everything in life is ordained by
god. In a rising water level caused by incessant rain, the people of his village felt insecure. As the floodwater continued to
rise, they shifted to a safer place with the assistance of relief workers. There was, however, this believer who refused to
leave the place. He kept telling that god would help him and he was safe. The water inundated his house and he climbed to the
rooftop. The rescue team went in boat to save him, still he refused to leave. He told them that god was with him and he was
destined to survive the floodwater. Soon the water reached rooftop and the man was drowned. In the heaven, he complained that
god let down a true believer by not saving him from drowning. Then god asked him who else had sent the rescue vehicle or the
boat to save him and who had refused the help. Blind belief in destiny is as fatal as this story.

According to Sir Mark Tully, life is like a hand of cards that we are dealt. We have no power to change our hand but we have
the choice to play well or badly. Even the bad hand of cards played intelligently may make us achieve more than the good hand
played carelessly and stupidly. Some people believe that ninety-five per cent of life is predestined and only five per cent
influenced by free will, but that five per cent can make the difference. It is like the tea we take everyday � a cup of which
is more than ninety per cent water, five per cent milk, two per cent sugar and just one per cent tea, but influences the
entire flavour of the brew, and we call it tea instead of water or milk or sugar. Like tea, free will is a powerful
interventionist in our life and it determines its flavour.

Intelligence, for example, is partly what we inherit and fairly how we develop it by using it, sharpening it in a deliberate manner.
The Civil Services Examination is fiercely competitive and those who succeed in it are no doubt endowed with reasonable intelligence.
Success in it inspires some to strive for more, not in narrow professional detail but in acquiring knowledge and development of
overall human competence, while in others it brings a sense of reaching the goal of life and that stunts further growth. Obviously,
there are more of the latter because majority of these bright young men waste away their life in intellectual retardation � not
necessarily professional stagnation � because success in CSE ensures that they reach somewhere in the career destination after they
join their profession. This is an example of free will guiding us on to different plane of exhilarating journey detouring from the
destiny of bureaucratic straitjacket.

As I am writing this, I see a program in the TV � a domesticated leopard unable to live like others of its species. Its human adopters
are trying to empower this pet to live in the wild. It is certainly not the destiny of this lovely animal to become a misfit for the
life in the wild or to relearn to live there � its natural habitat. The circumstances of its upbringing have changed the course of its
life. The Naga sadhus who periodically descend on the plains during Kumbh Mela from their mountain abodes that provide a visual feast
with their unclothed bodies in cold wintry settings, are not following destiny. They choose to live that lifestyle, which seems weird
to many.

Life is a journey in which the broad contours are delineated for each one of us but we have to work out the details ourselves. The
ultimate destination of life � all forms of life � is death, but its growth is dependant on environment, upbringing and free will,
and not entirely on inheritance. It may be that the law of karma is a process of DNA encryption containing the mysteries of life.
We influence it and provide the input that governs the course of journey in the space between birth and death. At times, destiny of
those who reach somewhere that neither they nor others expect, makes the concept of destiny and free will more mystifying. Maybe
our present madam President falls in this category! Did she ever try to become what she is today or did those who made it possible
for her to become it have any plan beforehand to put her there?

While the debate on destiny and free will may never end, the mystery of life and death and our role in this world is an eternally
engrossing subject. The journey is far more fascinating than the arrival. If we knew where we would arrive, we would not do anything
extraordinary and the progress that we have experienced in this world would not have come by. Mystery is the fuel that ignites thought
and certainty douses it. We consult astrologers, soothsayers, palmists and all kinds of fortunetellers in our anxiety to know what lies
ahead without realizing it is the uncertainty that provides us with the appetite for life.

(The writer is Chief Information Commissioner, Asom)