Nous tissons notre destin, nous le tirons de nous comme l’araignée sa toile. — Francois Muriac
We weave our destiny, we draw it from ourselves like the spider spins its web.
I don’t believe in fate. I don’t subscribe to the notion of a higher being with a plan for me. But I know life is not random, either, although there are times when the random delights or damages us for a moment or forever.
In my philosophy, the four most powerful things in the universe are love, joy, fear and choice. History is made from their stew. People live and die for them, from them. We stand tall or twist ourselves out of true by the choices we make from love and joy and fear. Most of those are small daily choices about whether to do, how to respond, what to let in and keep out. And from those things we weave ourselves. My life is the web of my choices.
Destiny is a funny word. I don’t believe in destiny spelled out in a Big Book somewhere, as if the universe was simply some giant cosmic puppet theatre. I choose not to see myself and my life reduced to that. So I do not think there is A Path I Am Meant To Walk, and yet it is clear to me when I’m doing things that… hmm. That fit with the essential core of me, the soul, the spirit, whatever you choose to call it. I know when I feel aligned and when I don’t. I know when I am out of true.
As I get older, I trust more and more my own instincts about these choices. I trust my sense of whether things are right or wrong for me, my sense of when to act and when to stand still. I trust that I can be hurt and survive, and so I no longer always need to blindly defend myself against the possibility of pain. I trust that I can be joyful without the other shoe dropping on me, and so I no longer always need to “deserve” happiness. I trust that I can live with complexity, and so I am no longer so afraid to feel whatever it is that I feel.
And even when the random intervenes, even when things happen that I did not choose, it is still my choice how to respond.
And so I make my choices and my life weaves itself around me. And many of those choices the last couple of years have been big ones, the kind that alter the patterns forever. I am not who I expected to be. And yet I am totally myself. I’m creating daily a destiny that can only be mine, because it is made of my choices, my love, my fear, my joy.
And just in case I’m sounding a little too far inside my own navel, I hasten to add that the Muriac quote from which spring all these musings comes from one of my favorite t-shirts:
You can find all the quotes and translations here. Perhaps they’ll make you muse too, or perhaps they’ll just make you want to find a baguette and the nearest bottle of wine. Happy Saturday, either way.
Cool t-shirt. I like those quotes. And I really like what you said about trust. I think that my level of trust still varies at times. When I remember to trust, I make my choices more out of joy and love than fear. Thankfully, that happens more often than not these days.
This reminds me of some lines I read in a novel (The Fifth Sacred Thing) this morning – talking about this very thing. How there are billions of threads, and that we each have the knife to cut the threads we want to choose to weave together to make the possibilities reality for us.
I just walked in the door with a baguette and a bottle of wine. Cheers!