Plinky.com asked me whether I believe everything happens for a reason.
Nope.
Well. Maybe a qualified nope.
Firstly, everything happens because something happened before it. Every moment builds from the moment before it. So, there is always a reason something happens.
But that isn't what this prompt is getting at, is it?
This is another of those questions that play into human-kind's inflated opinion of its place in things. If you follow my posts, you know I think of us as animals, though I am in awe of the beauty we can create, we're animals all the same.
It's the ultimate deterministic statement: things happened because what's happening now was *meant* to happen.
For our human intellect, seeking context and causality, it's a comfort to believe in destiny or a metaphysical god or guardian angels or…
It's all good – just how people rationalize their irrational existence.
But there is a difference between 'things happen for a reason' and 'I can create a narrative about how and why things happened that helps me contextualize my present'. We ALL do the latter, and sometimes shorthand it into the former.
So, do I choose to reflect on what's happened, learn from it and use that learning as I move forward? Mostly
[though I'd be lying if I didn't admit awareness that I have blind-spots for learning]and so as I look back, I can say that things have happened that have made a difference for me, due to my reaction and learning – in the rear-view mirror
they, of course, look like they happened for a reason – but that's my historic narrative in action not any reflection of pre-destiny.
And, by the way, you/me/everybody tend(s) to discount and forget those things that don't fit into the narrative we're creating – so we only recall those things that played into the 'happened for a reason' hypothesis. That's called confirmation bias.
Tomorrow, some things that I expect to happen will happen, some things I don't expect to happen will happen.
There'll be no reason until I invent one.
