Fate and Freewill: The riddle
For centuries people have believed in Fate and Karma. For about the same time people also believed that everything happens because of effort, freewill, our mind and our thoughts. These people told others that there is nothing called fate. They said it is just an imagination or a weakness of the mind to assume that there is a fate for all of us. According to them whatever happens is due to freewill.
Read the following lines from Mathew (The Bible). The situation is the last supper. Jesus Christ, the all knowing One, says that one of his own disciples will betray Him. So one by one they ask Him, “….is it me…is it me….” and to each one of them He says, “No. It is not you”. However when Judas Iscariot asks the same question, Jesus Christ says, “Yes. It is you”.
However in his reply Jesus Christ clearly points out to the power of Fate and Karma.
Jesus Christ:“The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.”
The betrayal of Jesus Christ by Judas Iscariot is also known as the Kiss of Judas. The soldiers are unable to arrest Jesus Christ because they cannot identify Him. Judas helps them identify Him by his kiss. The place is the garden of Gethsemane, the time is after the Last Supper.
“As it is written about” means a predetermined aspect of life that is referred as fate. To fulfill His fate, a betrayer is needed. Imagine there is a post called the President of USA. Someone has to fill in the post. The post can never be vacant. In the same way there is space for a betrayer of Jesus Christ. Someone has to get into that seat to fulfill the destiny.
So Jesus Christ says, “It would be better for him if he had not been born”. The meaning of this is, Judas Iscariot has been a great sinner which made it possible for him to occupy that seat. Everyone cannot get into that bad seat. Only a sinner from a past life will be allotted that space.
So you cannot argue that since the fate of Jesus Christ was predetermined, what is wrong with what Judas Iscariot did. He did something in accordance to the fate of Jesus Christ. Though he did it, Judas is a bad person. Because of that he was allotted the position of the betrayer.
Spending some time on these lines will reveal a lot about Karma and Effort more than reading an entire book on this topic. Hence I decided to discuss this at the beginning of this article.
Effort is supreme and that is the main cause of success.
Some people have told me many times that “I believe more in effort than in the planets, karma, fate and blah blah. So I have no time for planets, astrology and discussions about this kind of nonsense”. Whenever people say this I often noticed the super ego flashing on their faces because many of these people are so proud of their effort not knowing that fate made them put in all that effort. At least 50% of it was predetermined.
I doubt if Vedic Astrology ever denounced effort. In fact it was always telling you about where to put in your effort. At least no book of Vedic Astrology has ever said that you can stop working because fate will take care of it.
Effort is the arm of destiny. Without effort, destiny cannot unfold itself or manifest.
Ask people who put in much effort for many years. They usually will say, “despite my effort I did not succeed at all”. When you begin to look around you will find that some people put very little effort and got the success that eluded most people who put in tremendous effort.
Many will say that such such people did not put in the right kind of work. They were not smart workers. This is the usual complaints. However when people succeed everyone is sure that they were smart workers.
Does effort always lead to success?
Effort is the main component of success. Whenever people succeeded in their work, the effort they put in is always noticed by everyone. For example when people win the Olympic gold medal it is obvious that their hard work has been the cause. Does that mean that the people who went home empty handed did not put in hard work. Perhaps you may say not as much as the champion. So your winning and losing is not just determined by your own effort, it is rather determined by how much others have put in. So it means that your effort is not just enough. How do you know how much effort the other person is putting in while you are practicing miles away from the eventual champion?
So the question is do all the people who have put in hard work succeed in life or reach the top. The world lauds the winner. All others who put in so much effort but failed to make it to the top have never been spoken of and none of us know them.
For example only if you reach Mount Everest people come to know of you. If you have reached a little short of Mount Everest you are not covered by the newspapers and even you will not relish that. So what happened to all that effort you put in.
If you are a winner the world loves you and flatters you. If you just miss the final winning no one bothers to even think of you. You just are ignored. Everyone is looking only at the winner. Those who won will tell the world how their effort yielded the success.
If there is a fate for a winner there is also a fate for the loser. In fact the winner’s fate includes the loser’s fate too. The effort that both put in will be in accordance to their fate. The loser of today will win the world championship next time. So that means effort has to be put in continuously until fate also falls in place at an appropriate time. So losing and winning is not the issue. Only effort is because effort is a long time matter and fate happens in a moment.
It is like the arrow (effort) takes a long time before it reaches the target (fate).
Vedic Astrology deals with Karma which in turn deals with when the arrow reaches the target.
Life is like Sailing
In sailing you will notice that your experience in sailing is much dependent on the wind factor which is definitely not in your control. It has nothing to do with your effort.
The other main thing that affects your sailing is your effort in harnessing the winds to your advantage. So effort works very closely with fate.
When there is no wind, no amount of effort will let you move if you are sailing.
Though the wind and the effort are 2 different things when it comes to the actual act of sailing they are inseparable. So do not think that if a transit of Jupiter and Saturn is good you will succeed without any effort. It just means that the wind is blowing well and is pushing you forward but only if you have the sail in place to take advantage of that.
If there is no wind, even then you can start to row with the help of oars. Sailing is possible only when the wind of fate is pushing you on. Rowing is recommended when there is no wind at all.
So effort is always supreme and recommended. At the same time, why use the oars when there is a good amount of wind. Find out which way is better. Find out which way the wind blows.
Sailing – involves 2 forces. 1. The force of the wind that is not in your control and it was already allotted to you. 2. Your effort that is also based on the wind (fate). Without the wind there is no point putting in the effort.
Napoleon Bonaparte and Fate
There is no such thing as accident; it is fate misnamed. – Napoleon
The torment of precautions often exceeds the dangers to be avoided. It is sometimes better to abandon one’s self to destiny. – Napolean
Somebody asked Napolean, “if you believe so much in fate, then why do you wan to fight the war” meaning why don’t you sit back and relax. Napoleon replied, “fighting in all these wars is part of my fate and that is why I am doing it”. So it is clear that if fate has to work you will have to co-operate with it. There is no way you can sit back and relax.
The person who must succeed according to fate, will put in the maximum effort automatically so that his fate is fulfilled.
Karma and rebirth ideas are non verifiable!
Many of my readers and sometimes a few clients have expressed their doubts on rebirth, past life and karma. They say, “no one has really proven all this”. I tell them that your life that is reflecting from your horoscope is proof enough. The lives of famous and infamous people of the world whose horoscopes have been discussed time after time has proven rebirth and karma.
Do you have to see it to believe it?
For example even without seeing my great grand father, I know that he must have existed. Even without seeing Helium it was said that the SUN has helium using certain methods. Helium was later seen on earth. We can infer a lot of things like that. That is the sign of intelligence.
Detectives find out the murderer without actually seeing the murder. Grand-master chess players can visualize the board after 3 or even 10 moves which ordinary chess players cannot which is why they lose. Karma is not an excuse invented by the wisest men from ancient India. It is the reality that explains everything in life which any other method of reasoning cannot. You need to be patient and keep investigating. One day it will become clear to you.
Child prodigies are clear signs of remembering the past lives. In one of our Rotary Club meetings a child about 6 years old, was the guest speaker of the meeting. She was so small that we made her sit on the table instead of the chair. She knew the entire Thirukkural written in Tamil – a very old book of 1330 couplets that have today been translated into so many popular languages of the world. The author Thiruvalluvar was an extraordinary poet and saint. There are 133 chapters each addressing to a particular area of life.
We only had to tell the chapter number and poem number and she would immediately recite the lines. We failed in our attempts to defeat her.
Capablanca a World Chess Champion between 1921 to 1927 was famous for his end game skills and speed of play. He was called the human chess machine.He learned the rules of the game at the age of four by watching his father play, pointed out an illegal move made by his father, and then beat his father twice.
Most of us remember subconsciously the past life. We carry forward many things that are related to knowledge from one life to the next. So knowledge is the most important thing in our lives worth accumulating for it will come with us into our next births. Habits, good and bad get carried forward. So beware of the bad habits. Develop good habits.
The work of Dr. Brian Weiss is proof enough. Most of his books are best sellers which mean people have now taken past life to be a thing of the present. This knowledge was available in India for over 1000s of years and yet no one really cared to acknowledge it. “Same souls many bodies” is one of the books he has authored. Sri Krishna tells Arjuna “you have lived 1000s of lives, but you do not remember them”. Of course Bhagavad Gita is also a bestseller these days thank to the Internet. “Many lives, Many Masters” is another popular book from the same author.
Fate and Effort
You may spend a life time debating the cause of your success and everyone’s success. Is it fate or effort? At certain points in your life you may think that fate is all powerful. Such thoughts come to you when your effort does not work. However when your effort pays off, you feel that there is no fate. You suddenly get the idea that believers of fate are really stupid.
You will never find the answer. That is because Fate and Effort is one and the same or they are so much intertwined that they are inseparable. Effort becomes your fate at a later stage. Fate forces you to put in more effort.
On your fate, your efforts ride like a man his horse. Together they succeed. When they succeed you will never know whether it was due to the man or due to the horse that carried the man. Man is the effort, the horse is the fate.
The horse is a separate entity. Yet the man riding it seems to be in control. He is. Is not the horse also limiting the man. He is completely trusting the horse. If you look closely you do not know who is controlling. The man or the horse? So effort and fate are like these.
To world or the spectators, the man and the horse are two inseparable unit of either success or failure. When the cup or the medal is given it is given only to man – the effort. Nobody realizes that the horse was also responsible. So effort alone is visible to people. Fate exists on the background of whatever we do.
Effort is the paint on the canvas of Fate. Once the painting is done, the canvas and the painting are 2 inseparable things.
If you can change your effort you also will be changing your fate. When your fate is changing your effort will also start changing in tune to the fate.
So never stop putting more effort during tough times.
Those who know Vedic Astrology think that during a Sade-Sati period (7.5 years Saturn phase) nothing is going to work. Wrong. All it means is that you got to work harder to change your fate.
So rely 50% on the Astrological remedies and for the other 50% you should increase your efforts to the maximum during a tough time like Ketu Dasha endings or a Rahu-Saturn period.
The remedies that you do will help you put in more efforts. That will start changing your fate.
Some of my clients feel that only if their fate permits it, they do the remedies. When they do the remedies their problems are solved. So they get the idea that doing the remedies is also part of fate.
Remember the fate of this life is actually due to the effort (good and bad effort) put in during your previous life. So good and bad effort done in this life will begin to alter your experiences in the current life. It will also give you credit points or debit points for your next life.
Right knowledge is supreme. Pray to God asking for right knowledge.
Right knowledge is essential. Mere argument about fate and freewill is not going to solve our problems.
The case of the Mango Seed
Take a good look at the following picture. If you know it is the mango seed it reveals 2 facts. That photo is of good quality and that you are familiar with a mango seed.
This is a mango seed. The seed contains the full program of a giant mango seed.
From this seed those who know about plants and trees know that a mango tree will surely come out. They also will know that a coconut tree or a banyan tree will never come out.
The seed contains the entire coding for making a mango tree.
One who know all this can say that the mango seed will become this at a particular time, then during April flowers will appear on the tree and then the mango fruits will follow. The leaves will be of this particular shape. All that is predictable.
It is predictable because millions of times this has happened.
The mango sapling that will come out of the mango seed is predictable to a great extent.
What comes out of the Mango Seed is predictable. Nothing else is possible.
What is not predictable about the Mango Seed?
Will this Mango Seed always become a mango sapling and then become a big mango tree? No. For example to disprove the prediction I have a mango seed on my office table to show to my clients. I never gave the right opportunities for that mango seed. I kept it on my table just to disprove the fact that the mango seed will become a mango tree. I use it to prove that some effort is required to make a prediction come true. The mango seed requires soil and water. A prediction will become true provided certain other things are also done.
All the mango seed in the world will not become a mango tree. Something else is required. Environment and opportunities play a vital role in fulfillment of a prediction.
Moral of the story:
Match your effort with whatever positive is indicated in your horoscope. Do not do what you should not do. Follow the do’s and don’ts. Examine the strength, weakness, opportunities and threats.
If you have Rajayogas in your chart you should try to work hard until you become a celebrity or a notable person.
If you are not supposed to become a business owner then never attempt to become one. If everyone want to be a business owner who will be employed in a business. Did you get this point?
If you are the fish you can never succeed on land no matter what you do.
If you are the duck you can be both on land and on water, but you will be better off if you are in water.
If you are an elephant you better be on land. If in water even a crocodile can hurt you or even destroy you.
