Skip to main content

Destiny


One of O V Vijayan’s characters narrates a parable to show how we may not be able to alter our destiny, not much at least.

A bullock, one of a pair used for drawing a cart, prayed, “Oh God, why did you give me this destiny?  You have not only made me a cart-bullock but also fixed my place on the right side of the cart.  The driver uses his whip relentlessly and it is on my back it falls all the time.  If you can’t alter my destiny of being a cart-bullock, at least change my place from the right to the left side.”

God decided to grant the wish.  The bullocks and the cart were sold on the same day.  The new owner placed the bullock on the left side.  And the new driver was left-handed.

Well, I really don’t think that our destiny is entirely out of our control.  Some things are beyond our control, but some are certainly within control.  For example, Mark Antony’s meeting with Cleopatra might have been beyond his control, but choosing to let Rome melt in the Tiber of his lust was his choice.  Or should we say that the lust was in his genes and the genes were not his choice?  Such a line of argument will lead us to absolute determinism, and then we will be nothing more than puppets in the hands of destiny.

Sisyphus
I accept the view of the Existentialists that we mould our destiny to a large extent by the choices we make. 

Sometimes we may feel like Vijayan’s bullock, unable to make any meaningful choice.  We can, then, alter our attitude to the given destiny.  Like Sisyphus*, we can take the boulder as a challenge, or we can even fall in love with the boulder. Even Sisyphus is not without choices, you see.


*Note: Sisyphus is the Greek mythological hero who was punished by gods to roll a boulder to the zenith of a hill.  But just before he touched the zenith, the gods would push the boulder down.  French philosopher and novelist, Albert Camus, wrote a brilliant essay titled ‘The Myth of Sisyphus’ in which Camus argued that our life was not much different from what Sisyphus was condemned to do.  But how we carry out the task of living is our choice.  
Labels:

Comments

  1. Sunil DeepakMarch 13, 2014 at 10:11 AM

    Nice debate without any solution! I like to pretend that everything is under my control :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 12:00 PM

      Good for you, Sunil ji. Sometimes such pretensions reap rich dividends!

      Delete
  2. UnknownMarch 13, 2014 at 10:43 AM

    I do believe in destiny but at the same time, it doesn't stop from going after what I want. It's just that when I don't achieve the goal after working hard, I leave it to destiny!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 12:00 PM

      Destiny becomes an excuse, Pankti?

      Delete
    2. UnknownMarch 13, 2014 at 1:17 PM

      No...more like consolation :| Otherwise working hard for nothing can make one depressed and suicidal. sigh..

      Delete
    3. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 7:24 PM

      Consolation, yes. Absolutely. Opium of the masses.

      Delete
  3. Preethi VenugopalaMarch 13, 2014 at 11:43 AM

    Sisyphus has similarity to 'Naranath branthan' except that naranath rolled the boulder for pleasure and let it roll down...
    Destiny is in our hands I believe but emotions are coded in the genes. And mostly emotions pave way for our downfall..:(

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 12:01 PM

      Yeah, I think the legend of Naranath Bhranthan is superior to the myth of Sisyphus insofar as the former is choosing the absurdity.

      Delete
  4. AmitAagMarch 13, 2014 at 12:24 PM

    Camus may not get everybody's approval, but your open ended post is thought provoking and wonderful!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Kokila guptaMarch 13, 2014 at 1:06 PM

    One line my mother had been saying constantly- "Jo bhi AB paristhiti hai, usme wisest decision lo aur apna best karo."
    And 'AB' or 'NOW' is of importance as it indicates that dont try to change the situation INSTEAD alter YOUR actions and perception.... situation will automatically alter in your favour. Believe me , IT WORKS !

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 7:19 PM

      It does, Kokila, I bet. I have written much about SFBT, Solution Focused Brief Therapy, which I use with my students. The whole focus is on the NOW.

      Delete
  6. ManiparnaMarch 13, 2014 at 2:34 PM

    We build our own destiny and call them fate... it's true to great extent..

    ReplyDelete
  7. UnknownMarch 13, 2014 at 4:03 PM

    I believe in destiny but I also believe that the word destiny should not be used as an excuse for one's own weaknesses which I see happens most of the times.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 13, 2014 at 7:21 PM

      A very astute response, Namrata. There is much that is beyond our control and that has to be accepted. What is within our control should not be made an excuse. I'm just paraphrasing you. Thanks.

      Delete
    2. UnknownMarch 13, 2014 at 8:46 PM

      And I would be happy enough if you could share your views upon this..
      http://namratakumari.blogspot.in/2014/03/the-theory-of-soul-mates.html

      Delete
  8. AnonymousMarch 13, 2014 at 5:03 PM

    There are different personality and everyone has a different approach to things ! a nice read !

    ReplyDelete
  9. NamrotaMarch 13, 2014 at 9:38 PM

    I dont know about destiny...but with whatever little experience I have had... I have learned to make a decision with clear mind and not fight the situation.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 14, 2014 at 9:35 AM

      If you are able to take decisions with a clear mind, you are the master of your destiny, Namrota. All the best.

      Delete
  10. SeetaMarch 14, 2014 at 10:21 AM

    That is such an apt story. I believe in destiny too.. what's to happen will happen, we need to learn how to adapt and make the best of it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 14, 2014 at 11:47 AM

      Some destiny and some choices - that's my stand, Seeta.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

Shooting an Elephant

George Orwell [1903-1950] We had an anthology of classical essays as part of our undergrad English course. Shooting an Elephant by George Orwell was one of the essays. The horror of political hegemony is the core theme of the essay. Orwell was a subdivisional police officer of the British Empire in Burma (today Myanmar) when he was forced to shoot an elephant. The elephant had gone musth (an Urdu term for the temporary insanity of male elephants when they are in need of a female) and Orwell was asked to control the commotion created by the giant creature. By the time Orwell reached with his gun, the elephant had become normal. Yet Orwell shot it. The first bullet stunned the animal, the second made him waver, and Orwell had to empty the entire magazine into the elephant’s body in order to put an end to its mammoth suffering. “He was dying,” writes Orwell, “very slowly and in great agony, but in some world remote from me where not even a bullet could damage him further…. It seeme...
13 comments
Read more

Urban Naxal

Fiction “We have to guard against the urban Naxals who are the biggest threat to the nation’s unity today,” the Prime Minister was saying on the TV. He was addressing an audience that stood a hundred metres away for security reasons. It was the birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel which the Prime Minister had sanctified as National Unity Day. “In order to usurp the Sardar from the Congress,” Mathew said. The clarification was meant for Alice, his niece who had landed from London a couple of days back.    Mathew had retired a few months back as a lecturer in sociology from the University of Kerala. He was known for his radical leftist views. He would be what the PM calls an urban Naxal. Alice knew that. Her mother, Mathew’s sister, had told her all about her learned uncle’s “leftist perversions.” “Your uncle thinks that he is a Messiah of the masses,” Alice’s mother had warned her before she left for India on a short holiday. “Don’t let him infiltrate your brai...
14 comments
Read more

Bihar Election

Satish Acharya's Cartoon on how votes were bought in Bihar My wife has been stripped of her voting rights in the revised electoral roll. She has always been a conscientious voter unlike me. I refused to vote in the last Lok Sabha election though I stood outside the polling booth for Maggie to perform what she claimed was her duty as a citizen. The irony now is that she, the dutiful citizen, has been stripped of the right, while I, the ostensible renegade gets the right that I don’t care for. Since the Booth Level Officer [BLO] was my neighbour, he went out of his way to ring up some higher officer, sitting in my house, to enquire about Maggie’s exclusion. As a result, I was given the assurance that he, the BLO, would do whatever was in his power to get my wife her voting right. More than the voting right, what really bothered me was whether the Modi government was going to strip my wife of her Indian citizenship. Anything is possible in Modi’s India: Modi hai to Mumkin hai .   ...
14 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
19 comments
Read more