Do You Believe You Were "Meant" To Have A Certain Life Due To A Divine Plan?

"You are destined to work in Central Bank of Nigeria. You need to find the spouse you were meant to be with!.You just need to find what you were destined to do!"  Now, what if I told you, you were destined to die of carbon monoxide poisoning at age 43 because your generator had a defective exhaust pipe ...". Do you really believe you were "meant" to have a certain life due to a divine plan?


A huge percentage of people believe this. Don't tell me it's because you're a Christian or Muslim and thus believe that "God has a plan for your life". God's plan for you is for you to not act like a complete shithead (love your neighbour as yourself, impact positively on humanity and of course worship Him). Nowhere does He say that every man and woman has a soul mate they're destined to find, or a career they are destined to be successful in, or a city they are destined to live in.

It's entirely up to you to make the right choices in your career, life partner etc. You simply live with your mistakes or your successes.

You carve your own destiny, and for us privileged folks reading this, it's horrible news -- it means you have to forge your own future, and the potential for you to screw it up is huge. Life isn't a movie -- there's no script, no guaranteed happy ending, you simply have to find your path. You have to make that path by deciding on what you want to do and working on it, one day at a time.

I think people use "Just find what you were meant to do!" to really mean "Just figure out what your talents are." But for most of us, that won't be apparent for years and years -- you have to try a bunch of things and see what works. And what "works" isn't "what you are instantly good at the first time you try it," but rather "what engages you, and what you seem to be able to make satisfactory progress learning."

It would be super easy for a successful music star to say, "You see! My hit song was all meant to be by God!" No, because as far as I'm concerned, success is just the result of the long hours you put into hard work, dedication and persistence; they all sum up to earn you more chances to get lucky. The more stuff you do, the more people you meet and impress, the more chances for opportunity to come your way.

For the music star to act like his/her hit track was "meant" to happen would also be implying that all of the people suffering in IDP camps in the North-Eastern part of Nigeria are part of God's plan.

And no, my grand message here isn't that life is random and meaningless, (as long as a single person exists on Earth who needs something you're capable of providing, your life will have meaning).

But there's no magic formula for making it happen. You just have to keep grinding and trying things, and eventually something will come along. Or not. Who knows?