I don't think I'm much of a control freak. Not any more or less than the average person. In fact, maybe even a little less. I'm comfortable with other people taking the lead in most things and have a lot of trust in others. But there are a few places where the lack of control is terrifying.
Death is the main one.
It seems like we as human beings feel a need to create the illusion that we are in control in the big areas of our lives. Like the superstitious rituals of baseball players wearing their lucky pair of socks, I think we all have these little rituals that we like to think prevent disaster.
When my boyfriend had to fly to London unexpectedly, I was hit with an enormous fear that his plane would go down. This was just projecting my own fear of planes onto his situation, but I couldn't figure out how to release that fear and put faith and trust in the universe.
I've heard a lot about "manifesting" and "the secret," which believes that you can control your fate by visualizing what you want and putting positive energy into that visualization. I've heard a lot of people using prayer to feel in control of the outcome of something. My dad surprised me by saying that he's always felt that if he visualized the worst case scenario it couldn't happen because only the unexpected seems to happen.
All just illusions to make us feel better because living with the knowledge that you will not be in control of when and how you die is terrifying.
I'm thinking about this because of a train accident. I work in historic Ellicott City, where very late Monday night, a train went off the rails and dumped twenty-one train cars and their cargo of coal all over Main st. Two young women were killed.
They were 19 years old, on holiday from college, and they had been sitting up on the bridge where the train passes. They had probably been drinking. But they weren't on the tracks and if the train had functioned normally, they would have been fine. Somehow, at the moment that the train was passing them, something went wrong and the two girls were buried in coal and killed so fast that their bodies were found still sitting.
People have had mixed reactions to this.
I will admit that my first instinct is to say "They were being stupid. They were on the tracks. They shouldn't have done that. It's their own fault."
It's so very tempting to continue with that line of thinking. Because then it isn't random. It isn't out of my control. They died because they made a stupid choice.
But I don't think it's that simple.
People hang out at that bridge all the time. It wasn't the wisest choice, but it doesn't mean they were courting death. What a crazy freak accident to be killed by coal falling from train cars. How more unlikely can you get?
On Facebook there is a friend of a friend trying to say that we do control being safe. She makes good choices and is careful. She would never go near train tracks, she wears her seat belt, she doesn't drink, she goes to bed early, etc. Good for her.
But if death wants her, it will still find her.
People die from the strangest and most unpredictable events. A stranger could run off the road by accident and kill her standing on the sidewalk. Perhaps she would say she shouldn't be outside at all. Too risky. So her house could collapse on her. Perhaps she would say that she would have had it inspected more closely.So a gas leak could start in the middle of the night. Etc.
There are people who do insanely dangerous things every day and don't die from it. There are people who have never taken a risk and die in a freak accident.
This makes me really believe that everyone does have a "time" and there's nothing you can do to prevent it or make it come sooner. (Okay, maybe suicide. I haven't thought through that one!)
When my best friend died, she had done everything right all her life. No one would find fault with any of her behaviors. No one would be able to blame her for her own death.
It is a double tragedy that people blame these young girls for their own deaths, smug and secure in the knowledge that they would never do anything risky like that.
We are not in control. I hope the Gods are and that the universe is an ordered place as I've always believed it to be. But we are not in control of its pattern.
Death is the main one.
It seems like we as human beings feel a need to create the illusion that we are in control in the big areas of our lives. Like the superstitious rituals of baseball players wearing their lucky pair of socks, I think we all have these little rituals that we like to think prevent disaster.
When my boyfriend had to fly to London unexpectedly, I was hit with an enormous fear that his plane would go down. This was just projecting my own fear of planes onto his situation, but I couldn't figure out how to release that fear and put faith and trust in the universe.
I've heard a lot about "manifesting" and "the secret," which believes that you can control your fate by visualizing what you want and putting positive energy into that visualization. I've heard a lot of people using prayer to feel in control of the outcome of something. My dad surprised me by saying that he's always felt that if he visualized the worst case scenario it couldn't happen because only the unexpected seems to happen.
All just illusions to make us feel better because living with the knowledge that you will not be in control of when and how you die is terrifying.
I'm thinking about this because of a train accident. I work in historic Ellicott City, where very late Monday night, a train went off the rails and dumped twenty-one train cars and their cargo of coal all over Main st. Two young women were killed.
They were 19 years old, on holiday from college, and they had been sitting up on the bridge where the train passes. They had probably been drinking. But they weren't on the tracks and if the train had functioned normally, they would have been fine. Somehow, at the moment that the train was passing them, something went wrong and the two girls were buried in coal and killed so fast that their bodies were found still sitting.
People have had mixed reactions to this.
I will admit that my first instinct is to say "They were being stupid. They were on the tracks. They shouldn't have done that. It's their own fault."
It's so very tempting to continue with that line of thinking. Because then it isn't random. It isn't out of my control. They died because they made a stupid choice.
But I don't think it's that simple.
People hang out at that bridge all the time. It wasn't the wisest choice, but it doesn't mean they were courting death. What a crazy freak accident to be killed by coal falling from train cars. How more unlikely can you get?
On Facebook there is a friend of a friend trying to say that we do control being safe. She makes good choices and is careful. She would never go near train tracks, she wears her seat belt, she doesn't drink, she goes to bed early, etc. Good for her.
But if death wants her, it will still find her.
People die from the strangest and most unpredictable events. A stranger could run off the road by accident and kill her standing on the sidewalk. Perhaps she would say she shouldn't be outside at all. Too risky. So her house could collapse on her. Perhaps she would say that she would have had it inspected more closely.So a gas leak could start in the middle of the night. Etc.
There are people who do insanely dangerous things every day and don't die from it. There are people who have never taken a risk and die in a freak accident.
This makes me really believe that everyone does have a "time" and there's nothing you can do to prevent it or make it come sooner. (Okay, maybe suicide. I haven't thought through that one!)
When my best friend died, she had done everything right all her life. No one would find fault with any of her behaviors. No one would be able to blame her for her own death.
It is a double tragedy that people blame these young girls for their own deaths, smug and secure in the knowledge that they would never do anything risky like that.
We are not in control. I hope the Gods are and that the universe is an ordered place as I've always believed it to be. But we are not in control of its pattern.
For me it seems it could be a mixture of both things. We could accidently be killed if we keep tempting fate such as a drug addict does. Going further over and over the line until...one day it's just too much. Or someone who constantly goes 90 in a 65mph zone. One day...just too many chances(like bunny foo foo).
ReplyDeleteMy father decided on New Year's Eve this past one. He simply stopped eating. He was an addict but had finally cleaned himself up. Because of the trauma his body went through to clean up...he had a stroke and heart attacks. Which left him bedridden. At this point, being such a tortured individual that he was....he just said...i am done.
and he was.
I do agree that mostly the world is very orderly and i am sure somewhere on each of us is some sort of date. Jyotish speaks of this very often...a time within the charts of our birth that is a very good area to see our departure. Those areas are good times...times when things appear very strong for an exit. But, fate plays a role too...and sometimes we avoid it for just a moment only to find it within the next area in the chart which indicated a very good chance we would be leaving.
If you have ever seen someone miraculously survive something only to die a year later in a very similar way...this sort of thing speaks of that.
We had this health junky triathalon teacher here who would grab the cookie out of a child's hand and scream...you're killing yourself!!!! She would preach to all of us about how healthy she had always been because of her thin state and only raw vegetable diet. One day, at the age of 31 she dropped over dead on her daily run. Died on the side of the road. She was the healthiest person we knew! But she apparently had a congenital heart defect that had went undiagnosed and was literally a ticking time bomb for a heart attack.
She did everything right, but it was just her time.
There are still some who seem to defy those rules of order. At least from my time here. It's just such a smaller number.
Those poor innocent girls from your story...i am grateful they did not suffer a long death. Sometimes i suppose folks need to distance themselves from the reality that we could go any minute. So they say..."I am not like her...she did something stupid to make her die". When the truth is, we could go any moment. Nothing will stop that...it is a condition of living here. She sound afraid Ambaa, very afraid.
Hari Om<3
"I do agree that mostly the world is very orderly and i am sure somewhere on each of us is some sort of date. Jyotish speaks of this very often...a time within the charts of our birth that is a very good area to see our departure. Those areas are good times...times when things appear very strong for an exit. But, fate plays a role too...and sometimes we avoid it for just a moment only to find it within the next area in the chart which indicated a very good chance we would be leaving."
DeleteI haven't heard that before. I like this a lot! Makes sense and seems to fit my observations.
"Sometimes i suppose folks need to distance themselves from the reality that we could go any minute. So they say..."I am not like her...she did something stupid to make her die". "
I think that's exactly it! And it is fear. I know that she's living in a little bubble of pretend safety and she's not ready to see outside of it yet. For me, I felt that fear and had the exact same thought "Oh it was their own fault" for about thirty seconds. And then I heard the foolishness and the disrespect in that.
How does the saying go? Once you have been born the bullet is fired from the gun and reaches you . No not quite,the real one sounds better but i cant think off it for the life of me. The coal falling from the waggon could have caused a fire and burnt a house or a whole street. I guess thats why many people adopt the slogan do what you can and pray for the rest. It happens as it happens. Personally I would prefer a sudden death more than one where i would have a year to live and then would live longer and keep wondering when finally will i die?even though in the latter case i would probaly be more in control of the situation.
ReplyDeleteNot that I will get a say in it, but I'm not sure which I would prefer. In the case of an illness where you can see it coming, it does give you a chance to prepare yourself and deal with all the emotions, to get yourself to a peaceful place. But sudden certainly has an appeal!
Delete