Life Seems Unreal At Times

 Illustration by Yuumei

https://www.yuumeiart.com/ 

Expected results guide our decisions every hour of the day, every minute actually. Yet, at the same time, we are victims of nature and everybody else’s decisions. This rids us of the ultimate control that we seek and in turn breeds frustration and fear.

Frustration in that no matter how 'in control' we think we are, we always end up lacking; lacking in our goals, in our planning, in our day to day life. This is because majority of circumstances that should lead to our success aren't up to us. While there might be few moments that favour us, most of the time we fail to have a favourable setting. Human nature makes us doubt ourselves after enough of such. Enough? Yes, because every person is different and has a different breaking point. After 'enough' of such failures one starts to doubt one's self... This doubt is a nesting place for fear.

And why do we fear.

Everyone alive has an ultimate end, death. An end that no one can control nor predict. This doesn't stop one from trying but after all efforts, ultimately one realizes that it's beyond them. This makes one obsess over things they 'can' control. That healthy diet, schedules, choice of friends... The small things that give one a sense of control, but in truth even this aren't under our control. A schedule, for example, is subject to traffic, colleagues' decisions and among other things the unlikely flawless flow of plans. That healthy diet is subject to finances, the environmental availability of chosen foods and even health.

Therefore, in reality, there is no freewill as a primary notion and idea. Freewill all comes after determinism has run its cause. Before we know ourselves we are already influenced. Before we can make a decision, we are already influenced. This makes our past basically predetermines our present. Our decisions are made in the present therefore subjective to our past. The fact that at that every moment we are free to choose our way forward is the point at which we directly experience freewill. That and the fleeting chance that we can decide just how much of our past we are willing to let affect us. That too can be in our control.

That realization that we are not fully in control breeds fear, an almost creeping fear that takes will power to overcome.

Wilma Masibo