"To see a world in a grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour."
William Blake - Auguries of InnocenceMankind has, since the birth of our consciousness, wanted to be able to predict the future. Whether the reason was preparation or prevention, a great amount of wealth was spent on consulting Oracles for the outcomes of battles, choosing kings and even determine the fate of empires the world around. From the Oracles of Delphi to the shamans of ancient tribes, different methods, sometimes quite barbaric, were used to divine answers to questions that would change the course of history.
I always wondered about this hunger for fore-knowledge. Would things be any different today had some of the predictions had different results? How accurate are predictions and what influence, if any, does the person giving the prediction has on the outcome? With so many tools now, much more civilised if I might say, then many of the ones used by our ancestors, is predicting the future really such a value as it was when conquerors used them to make life and death decisions?
I don't believe the your future is predetermined. I feel that would make the notion of karma, something I firmly believe in, quite redundant. There are challenges that you will need to pass within your lifetime, and they will be brought to you depending on what path you choose and those challenges change as you make your choices. If you keep avoiding making choices then one day you may very well find yourself not having a choice to make, being thrust into the storm to fend for yourself as best you can. The universe has a way of subtly letting us know what learning needs to take place and what path we will find it on. It is our choice to take it or not.
Many times I find myself being asked the same questions by clients. When will I get my finances sorted out? When will I find a mate? Will I get a new job? Again, a compulsive need to know what and when something is going to happen. Instead of learning the lesson in the current situation and allowing themselves to move on as the natural order of things, they want to know when that situation is going to be over or resolved.
It will be over and resolved when you learned the lesson that is in it. This is why we fall back into repeated negative patterns. We have not learned from them all that was the lesson or have not learned anything at all. Why am I in this situation again? Why does this keep happening to me? Familiar questions? Of course. These are the questions that need to be asked before the ones with the "when".
I would not be writing about this had I not gone through the same learning curve myself. I had a compulsion to want to know the future and had a miriad of "when" questions that were swirling in my mind constantly. I was so wrapped up in that, that I completely ignored the "why". I paid no attention to what the universe was telling me. Thinking back now, the path was clear cut with road signs all the way but I was too busy planning the trip to actually realise that I was going the wrong way or was not going anywhere at all.
It took my life to come to a tragic and screeching halt for me to realise that I had it all backwards. The true knowledge was never in the "when". It was in the lessons and the challenges and always has been. To recognise the opportunity for growth through the difficulties. To stop thinking about the imagined rewards that would wait for me on the other side and just immerse myself in the moment and be completely present. To absorb every single molecule of knowledge there is about the now. That is where the true power of knowledge is. Not in the knowing of where you're going but honouring where you have been.
If you truly wish to possess something or know something, be it a tangible thing or something intangible such as knowledge, you have to let go of it from the core of your being. If you don't, then your idea of the thing or your idea of possessing that it will be tainted by your perception of it, therefore cannot be what you truly wish to possess. It changes into something different, something that has the appearance of the thing you wanted but not the essence.
Only once we can truly let go of wanting to know the future will we possess the essence of it by living it.
