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"Everyone sits in the prison of his own ideas." Albert Einstein
"A man's character is his fate." Heraclitus

I do sometimes wonder if Free Will is actually free. Here we are creatures influenced by our "ideas" or "characters". That's hardly freedom is it? Sometimes I can try all I can to choose the 'right' thing but sometimes, just sometimes, I fail. Not by choice, simply because I'm limited to my nature. Sometimes it feels like I can flick a switch inside me where I can turn on and off things like memory, emotions and thoughts, but not all the time, I don't have the freedom to completely become another person and do other things.

There's something in my mind that I can't quite figure out about free will. Where does it come from? I mainly associate this problem with Chaos and Order. Now Order is completely mechanical, completely predictable and has no room for variation. And yet like Will it has a direction and focus.

What about Chaos? Now some say that this gives us the capacity for choice. There is no mechanics, there is no predictability, and infinite room for variation. But I still remain unconvinced. To me Chaos equates with completely spontaneous randomness. That is something that is not controlled nor predetermined, so this has no room for choice either.

If we had none of what Heraclitus called character, maybe that would be freedom. We'd have no conditions and infinite potential and yet that would mean there is no control, just randomness. Whereas Order or 'character' is conditioned and directioned like the Will of Free Will but is so rigid that it allows no variation, so I can't see where choice comes there either.

Yet humankind has evolved to percieve itself making 'choices'. Everyday I seem to make choices between one door or another, between toffee or mint icecream. I make my choice but then after reflection I'm unsure where it came from. Was it a predetermined desire or a completely random act where no thought determined it?

I think I would say that Free Will is a combination of Chaos and Order, Free=Chaos and Will=Order. I could still be wrong, there may be another alternative where 'choice' transcends the polarity of Chaos and Order, but because of the limited condtions of my mind I just cannot see it clearly.

Of course now I'm thinking pragmatically. None of this really matters, if I knew one way or another then that knowing would make no difference at all. If we don't have choice, well that's that, no choice. But if we do, well, we do and that's that too. Still the knowledge of one way or another isn't really an advantage.

The bottom line is that I percieve myself making choices, so I'll carry on with this awareness, whether illusory or not and carry on with my life as responsibly as I can and maybe, just maybe I could become the wiser.

"You may be dissapointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don't try." Beverly Sills

"Feel the fear and do it anyway." Anon

That about says it all really. There are times in life when you've gotta take the plunge, no matter the state of your confidence.
It's nice safely bumbling along through life but if you get stuck in a rut, sometimes you've gotta move beyond your fears and find new avenues in life.

"The beautiful thing about learning, is nobody can take it away from you." B.B.King

Another fantastic quote. WE CAN ALWAYS LEARN!!! Cool :)

This faculty seems almost as universal for life as death. Physically, emotionally, intellectually and spiritually there's always learning.

Right from the beginning DNA has, by trial and error, been learning what combinations work the best. Looking around at Nature we can see it has learnt vast complex multitudes of genetic variation!

Or emotionally. We learn what upsets us, what makes us happy, we can find us what works best and worst for our emotions. Although more emotionally aware creatures can create emotional traps for those less aware. For instance I go into a field of sheep and walk with a bucket of feed and usually this will get them interested, or if I yell and run at them they'll run away. I can do this with my dog, in subtle ways I can influence what she does but making her interested, altering my voice or my body language. On the other hand my dog's learnt how I tick and can pull 'puppy dog eyes' or be annoying to evoke or provoke a reaction lol.

Intellectually there' lots of facts and figures we can learn about, lots of things to measure and define, almost without end! And what with the human capacity for the imagination we can create things for other people to learn about; tools, stories, art, culture, the list goes on.

Also spiritually. Well this is a rather obscure subject. Noone really knows what it is or at least don't know how to adequately explain it. Each culture, subcultrue, subsubculture, and even subsubsub etc has a complex (or simple) system of symbolism, meditiation, ritual and belief, it's hard to pin point. BUT there is, once again, the possibility to learn! We can sift through the ideas and experiences of many people and compare it with our own with some idea, intuition or otherwise of what spirituality is.

And then who knows what other levels and arenas of learning there are?! It could go on for eternity! :O Wow, now there's a thought!

So, learn, learn and learn! Whether by education or experience, learn!

"The best life is spent preparing for death." Plato
Not very optimistic or comforting, so why say it?
Pretty simple, all life eventually dies, there's no avoiding it. If you have a problem with death then you have a problem with life. Noone living, leaves life alive... and we've all got to leave!Maybe death is the meaning of life, not salvation, or worshipping Allah or even biological reproduction, as these experiences aren't even that universal within life! In a world where death is so universal it's only sensible to contemplate and prepare for death.

Now this doesn't mean we should commit suicide. I'm not, life's too interesting! No, death comes whatever, suicide or not so there's no need to commit suicide. Personally I'd much rather die after a long and complex life that cut it short.

I've heard it said that we start dieing the day we are born. It's like we've been given a death sentense from birth. The only difference between "most people" and those who ARE on death sentence or who are terminally ill is that "most people" are less aware of their mortality.

Death is the ever present, silent companion that makes life real. Imagine immortality, without death. It would be dull and boring. It is mortality that makes life intense and vibrant instead of the same dull grey forever. Paradoxically those who are acutely aware of death can find a new zest for life not found when blind about mortality.

Another quote comes to mind though I don't remember who said it "Live each day like it's your last."