I have an empty white page in front of me. I could write anything. The choice is enormous, almost scary.
I choose to write about exactly this, the possibilities that I have. So I ask myself,
Should I write about commitment, because I have a friend who just canceled our date? Should I select the encounter I had with a cat the other day? I could also write about our funny neighbor. We call him ‘the ghost’ because we never see him.
I tilt my head from side to side, considering,
I could write about my experiences with the turtles. What if I used a spider web as my topic? Or would it even be more interesting for my readers to hear how I was able to break into my own house?
Should I? Could I? Would I? Do I?
While I considered all these options I realized that my overthinking was actually holding me back from doing something. If that only applied to the example of not writing, little would be lost. However, this blank white paper could also be a blank new day! With what should I fill it? The day could easily pass while reviewing all the different alternatives. And, at the end, nothing would be accomplished.
For much of my life outer forces structured my days. First school, then as an employee, next caring for my family. When later in life I became self- employed, I had to learn to organize my days. I have to admit this was not always easy. There were days that I dawdled away or fidgeted around going from one place to the other not really knowing what to do. I was not very happy with myself during those times. Occasionally I would excuse myself by saying I needed a ‘creative pause.’ That might have even been true. Often, after a row of idle days I had quite a number of active ones. Nowadays, being semi-retired, I find it fascinating to have the freedom to do whatever comes to mind, whether it is filling a blank new page or the brand new empty day ahead of me.
The other day I looked at two pictures. The first one showed a woman who could be seen as either a young girl or an old witch, depending on how the observer saw it. I have often used this picture in my seminars to describe the different perspective one can have on life.
Can you see the face of the young girl AND the face of the old woman?
I was not familiar with the second image. It was a sheet of ones and zeros, the binary code, which was also used to illustrate the contents of the woman’s face.
Binary code of the previous image containing the two faces.
In this first example, the binary code inherently contained two images, the young girl and the old woman. How I saw the image depended on my interpretation and perception in any given moment. This alone was fascinating enough, but now imagine the binary code of a person’s life with infinite potential. There are so many possibilities that could be laid out to choose from. Does it mean that as soon as we are able to consciously think, we pick out our path in life? I am not sure. Maybe it might only look like a blank life, a blank day, a blank white page spread out in front of us. Could the truth be totally different? Could it be that our life has a blueprint, according to which it follows and our so-called free will is actually only messing it up?
After all, I wonder,
“Should I have filled my blank new page with the question,
Is there free will?”
I could have.