FATE OR WHAT?

When I was about 10 years old I walked into a shop one day and the lady behind the counter asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. Without thinking, I replied: ‘A writer, a soldier and a Dad.’
Now, I hadn’t really thought about any of these prior to this statement. Yet it was a fact that, as life panned out, I became, to a certain extent, all three. Is it possible that we can instinctively know our future at such a young age?

We could put it down to fate.

But I don’t like this word. It suggests that there is no free will, and whatever you do in life, it is inevitable how it will go. It makes me ask: what is the point of it all if we’re slaved to the inevitability of life?
I could take an existentialist view and argue it was my choice to do these things. But even here, it doesn’t work. Things happened later in life that led me in these directions, and cannot be related to the statement I made as a kid.

In this sense it’s a social thing.

We can claim to make choices, and be satisfied that they are our own. But the reality is we are categorized by our society and culture. Whatever choices we make are based on events in society, and interpretations of how society sees us.
But we can stack the odds in our favour; we can follow a certain path out of the multiple paths that open up to us. But I think we do this unconsciously. Deep inside, there is a real ‘you’ who know better than ‘you’ what you want out of life.
I think the real ‘me’ was active early, making me say things such as ‘a writer, a soldier and a Dad.’

© Anthony North, September 2007

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