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Godson Madu

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I need to understand the meaning of DESTINY in the face of CHOICE. Should I have a choice when it has already been destined?

I have struggled over the years to understand the concept of Destiny when I am constantly been groomed to make my own choices.

How do you accept my destiny when it is the product of the choices you make?

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    Atul Jadhav

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    Feb 2 2013: I think man creates his destiny by making informed choices. Every choice in life that you make has an 'opportunity cost' involved. Destiny in itself is an outcome, the end result . Our choices, right or wrong, ultimately makes our destiny. Both nature and nurture are involved in shaping our choices (multiple) and our destiny.

  • John Smith 30+

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    Jan 8 2013: "I have struggled over the years to understand the concept of Destiny when I am constantly been groomed to make my own choices.

    How do you accept my destiny when it is the product of the choices you make?"

    If your live is predestined then there's nothing you can do about it, if it's not then you can influence the future, either way you will never find out whether things are predestiend or not, so just don't worry about destiny and live your life as if there is no destiny.
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    Godson Madu

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    TEDx Organizer
    Jan 7 2013: @Mark Meijer, you seem to have the most realistic approach to this issue because on another thought, these two concept was inherited and not necessarily a product of my personal experience. @lynda Tailor very good conclusion

  • Mark Meijer 100+

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    Jan 5 2013: The one thing that "meaning" and "destiny" and "choice" have in common, is that they are all concepts.

    What if that's all they ever were? What if the reason you can't figure it out, is because people have invented those concepts without really knowing why or what they were supposed to represent? What if it can't be figured out because we're only chewing on an imagined problem that did not exist until our minds unwittingly conjured it up? Where have you actually encountered this problem, except in your thoughts?

    Maybe the fact that you acknowledge that you can't figure it out, means you are not crazy. Maybe you didn't invent those ideas, but just inherited or adopted them, and naturally assumed they were supposed to make sense. Maybe you can't make sense of them because they simply make no sense. Would that be too much to accept?

    What if you had never inherited or adopted those ideas in the first place, would it be too much to accept then, that they make no sense? Maybe it would be immediately obvious. Maybe what would be puzzling to you is that people get themselves so tied up into questions that nobody really seems to make sense of.

    Of course everyone will have their own answer, or their own reason for why there is no answer, or something. Lots of ideas about lots of things. One believes this, another believes that. Bla bla bla. There's quite a menu of ideas to order from. Something is bound to strike your fancy.
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    Gail . 50+

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    Jan 4 2013: We each create our own destinies. Change what your habitual thoughts/emotions are and you will change your self-created destiny.

  • Barry Palmer 50+

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    Jan 4 2013: You might take the empirical approach to this question.

    Do you know of any evidence to support the concept of destiny? I do not.

  • Eric Friday

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    Jan 3 2013: i myself dont believe in destiny you are the controller of youre life you decide where it will lead and youre mistakes have an impact on what happens. every choice you make shapes youre future
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      Linda Taylor 50+

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      Jan 5 2013: The ONLY thing you can control is choice. Everything else is destiny.
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    Linda Taylor 50+

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    Jan 3 2013: Godson, it is a matter of values. The value I am talking about is responsibility. For people who value responsibility of consequence, choice is paramount. For people who wish to let go of responsibility of consequence, they will fall back on destiny as the driving factor. So keep that in mind when you are discussing this with others. It is usually a clash of values.

    For me, there is a mix of destiny and choice. I would not have thought about doing what I do now as a career choice or a direction I thought I would take when I was younger. I had a series of opportunities (destiny) and followed the opportunity by choice. I could have elected not to and I could have gone a different direction. But the opportunities that manifest were not of my design or intent. So there is a mix between destiny and choice.
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    Peter Law 50+

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    Jan 3 2013: This comes up in the bible. God lives in eternity, we live in time. Our destiny is shaped by the choices we make; we have, in effect, free choice. From God's perspective though; time is something He manufactured for our convenience. He sees the whole of time, & so, from His perspective, our choices are already made, & our destiny settled.
    That's my best idea, but I'm sure it is more complex.

    :-)
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    Xavier Belvemont 30+

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    Jan 3 2013: I would say that the concept of 'destiny' is just an artificial directive forced onto people by others or a focus in attaning one particular goal either by choice or influence.
    I don't see how any such thing actually exists, so my argument would be to just do what you want to do (within reason) and disregard the notion.
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