I once talked to a philosopher who shared his perspective on how there’s no such thing as free will, at least not in the way we as societies and human beings often refer to it, think of it or fantasize about it. According to him, what we may often think of as free will is just a continuation of our conditioned beliefs, thought patterns and decisions based upon that.
In my personal view, free will does exist though it is in correlation to our awareness; the more aware we are, the more able we will be to actually embody the potential of our free will. It’s not that free will doesn’t exist for us, or that we’ll have either less or more of it, but it’s just that through being more self aware, we are then able to actually apply our true free will appropriately and make choices that are more conscious rather than conditioned.
Consciousness is the basis of free will, and it is at the basis of life itself. A big part of our life is moved through our unconscious, and while there will always be things that remain unconscious, most we can bring into our awareness and make conscious. There are certain things we can control, and others that we can’t control; there are certain things, situations, choices and deeper patterns that we may not be able to just “change” with our “free will”. But nonetheless, there is room for growth and self awareness to light our paths. Free will is a movement rather than an object.
As we become more self aware we then are better able to choose more wisely and live a more conscious and fulfilling life. There’s no more “predictions” because you now take life into your hands and are not as conditioned to old patterns and repetitive cycles. You now become a co-creator; an artist of life, the poet who becomes the poem, the singer who becomes the song of soul. You become the dancer who becomes the dance itself.
Free will is a grace, a divine grace, gifted to us to have the ability to choose to live a more conscious life and to evolve and grow – or in other words, it is our gift to be able to consciously choose to become conscious. No one can walk our walk for us; no one can be able to make us see or perceive something we haven’t yet awakened within us. The dedication towards self reflection and self reference in our every day is what opens our inner doorways and thereby, the outer ones also.
Whether you turn left or right is irrelevant without it being more conscious. At the heart of free will resides the heart itself, which is the initiatory portal to our consciousness. At the heart of free is consciousness; and without consciousness there’s no relevance to what free will is or isn’t. The essence of our existence and of being human, which is a great gift, is consciousness. Otherwise we are only skins walking around; we need to remember we are soulskins.
I do believe we have free will as human beings, but it seems we use it very little. Most who think they make choices of free will, don’t. And many who think they don’t have free will and everything is written in stone is actually because they don’t make the effort to do their inner work and make choices that are more conscious. Yes, certain things are as they are, that’s the river of life; but free will is always here to help with the flow and clarity of the waters we pour in and the currents we choose.
When we are always focusing on the external and how it’s everyone else’s fault, we are essentially keeping ourselves stuck. When we walk on the street without awareness that there are others walking around us, we bump into others, we hurt others, we walk like a herd. We have so many beautiful gifts – hands, feet, ears, noses, eyes; what good are the other senses if we don’t even know how to be aware of these and move our body more consciously. We follow orders, group mentalities, and often look like hampsters going round and round yet thinking we’ve discovered another land or risen.
We play in a sandbox. And we get stuck there. But if we can realize we are in the sandbox, and make the effort to stand up, dust off, we may go towards the swings. And we can swing, swing higher and see further. We can make more conscious choices. Perhaps we can build new things, think new thoughts, make new memories, experience ourselves in different ways.
In astrology, the one house that shows free will is our natal 3rd. It’s a house of movement, creativity, skills, talents and gifts, and mastering these through our very hands, effort and dedication. Devotion is the veil through which awareness shows its beautiful face. We go along the same circling staircases each day, every day, and yet the more we awaken with us, the more attention we pay to our walk, the more aspects and shades and nuances we’ll see on that same staircase.
The 3rd house was known as the moon’s temple where the priestesses would spend years to learn about who they were; know thyself, know the earth. Self knowledge is directly correlated to free will. This house rules the part of night when we are deeper in sleep, so by making the unconscious conscious we awaken ourselves. This house also rules our soul’s courage, because indeed, it is a courage of soul to live a more conscious life.
This is a creative house, ruling our talents and gifts, and yet our talents and skills have no meaning without our dedication and our choice to master in our craft and skills. We do this through dedication and conscious consistent amounts of effort. This is why in this house we see that we are given certain things in life, potentials, gifts, and yet the only way for us to dance them for others and bring them to life is through our own dedication, effort and choice. Free will too is our grace; and as human beings we have the potential for it, and a lot of it, but it needs us to consciously choose to be more conscious.
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Cover art: Japanese woman painting screen Abstract/medium: 1 photographic print : albumen, hand-colored with watercolor, 1890, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
