Everything and Everyone Else

I am a confident person, secure about my thoughts and feelings toward just about subject that I have some familiarity with. But a thought crossed my mind earlier today and normally, I would have had a confident, secure answer. Today, I didn't have the answer I would have expected. I posed the question, "Who is in charge of your life?", to myself and I momentarily blanked in my repsonse. I suppose this is a common enough question. It's one that we all probably ask ourselves from time to time. And I think if that question was asked of me a few months ago, whether by me or by someone else, I would have instantly replied, "I am!"


So as I thought more deeply looking for my answer, I realized that I was not in charge of my life at all. Well, I knew without a doubt that I was the custodian of my life. I also knew that I had ultimate veto power in matters pertaining to me. Additionally, I knew that I was the top decision-maker, but even so, that didn't answer the question. It began to dawn on me that everything and everyone else was in charge of my life and still is and will continue to be. I'll explain, if you promise to remember that I am its custodian with veto and descision power, etc, etc.


The courses of all of my days have been altered perpetually by everything and everyone else. Rainstorms have foiled my plans for an outing. It was in charge; I decided not to picnic in the rain. A person's expression has revealed to me that I was upsetting them or that they were worried about something. They were in charge; I made the decision to drop the subject or agreed to go to the movie of their choice, not mine -whatever the case may have been. My point is that this type of interaction is most certainly the most abundant kind, if not the only kind of interactions that we have. It seems that life itself is simply too dynamic to claim to be "in charge" of it.


Of course, by applying the control that we do have and using our veto power when we think we should, we can most assuredly direct the courses of our lives, but plans change. Not all ideas can come to fruition. The unexpected happens. Now, I understand the term "in charge" is open to interpetation especially when it lacks a definition, and I would never suggest that we are powerless or that we are not fully empowered for all decisons pertaining to ourselves and our well being.


What I am suggesting is quite shadowy, almost imperceptible. It is the underlying causes and effects that all things have and impose upon all things. It is the actions and reactions that happen in countless numbers all of the time, without pause or end. It is the suggestion from a friend, or the tone in the voice of a lover. It is the wiggle of a puppy that compelled us to bend to scratch it, even if our backs were sore. Puppy was in charge; we decided to bend.


Looking at these connections today, and in this context, enables me to answer the question that I asked myself this morning and I am quite comfortable in doing so. My answer is: "We are in charge of my life." But that leads to another, far more enlightening realization that is truly the heart of what I am saying.


It was the realization that if (I believe it is) my life is constantly and endlessly effected and influenced in such ways, then I damn better well start thinking more deeply and more considerately about everything and everyone else because, I also believe, that will surely come back to me and my life.