There
is no feeling as hopeless as the realization that you have very
little choice in controlling the chances you get in life. Do you
determine your destiny or your destiny is usually already
pre-determined? Or is it a bit of both?
During
our freshman years in campus we all had our own dreams and
aspirations that we set out to achieve out of life. Flash forward 10
years later, life does not really go down as planned, or does it? The
ones who thought would get married are still in between dates and
miserable, the outgoing ones who would naturally land a good deal are
busy being jack of all trades. I can bet we each know someone who was
good in accounts class but found themselves in marketing industry
because that is where an opportunity opened. The universe may at
times seem like it plays the cruellest jokes in our lives, and even
when the tough gets going you somehow start ‘adapting to your
fate’.
The
control enthusiast in me, is learning and adapting, albeit slowly
that most things in life will be determined by chance and there is
very little I could do to control it and that is just the way of the
universe. And I just have to trust, that all should work out not for
good but for the best. For instance, while learning to swim an
important lesson is that you have to trust the water to hold you up
while floating. So if the universe is God’s, and everything in it
his, myself included, I have to believe that the dreams I have and
have envisioned he did not put there in vain, neither can he be so
unfair to give me what he knows is not suitable for me.
However
that realization does not equate to giving up on our dreams, once
your eyes are on the prize there should be no holding back. In
Swahili there is a saying haba
na haba hujaza kibaba –
little savings go a long way. In the end all the efforts you put
will culminate to something substantial, a theory which we can apply
in all spheres of our lives. After all who was it who said you cannot
have it all? Aren’t we descendants of Abraham who through his faith
was promised blessings in abundance to his household?
Do
not settle for what comes your way out of desperation, or the feeling
that you could be running out of time. I saw a certain poster that
challenged me, if
you were told your life will be exactly the same in the next 10 years
would that make you happy? Then why are you so scared of change? The
grass on the other side will always be greener, but at your own pace,
chase your dreams regardless of the circumstances. When all is said
and done something got to give in the direction you work towards. It
is like the same universe that had been giving mixed signals in what
you were requesting, finally starts decoding your message, and
yielding opportunities which you thought maybe were just not meant to
be.
Whether
you determine your destiny, or your destiny is already
pre-determined, or it’s a mixture of both, could be a debatable
issue. But what am certain of, in the words of renowned World Hero
Nelson Mandela, there
is no passion to be found playing small,
fight so hard till fate accepts defeat.
