Recently, I was sitting at the funeral for my 29-year-old cousin, surrounded by the loud, aching cries of my family.
“What karma did I accumulate for this to happen?”
“This was her fate, God must have wanted her early.”
“I do not believe in God anymore. I just want my sister back.”
As tears streamed down my face, I could only sit there, grappling with the questions that hung heavily in the air. What did fate, karma and God truly have to do with this loss? Can we really say it was fate that she passed only seven months after her wedding? If fate controls our lives, does that mean that free will does not exist?
Was it destiny that sealed her fate that night, or was it a tragic consequence of human error, given that if the ambulance had arrived just 10 minutes earlier, it could have saved her life?
Questions have been swirling in my head for days.
I realize now that, for most of my life, I have been moving through faith and tradition somewhat blindly, following the paths laid out for me by my family without fully understanding them. But grief has a way of cracking things open. It pushes you to ask, to wrestle, to rethink.
And so, as I dive deeper into this tangled, complicated rabbit hole we call life, I invite you to follow along as I debate with myself. Is fate real, or is it just something we tell ourselves to make sense of the chaos?
Fate is real:
One could argue that fate is not just a mystical force; it is woven into the very fabric of who we are. From the moment we are born, we inherit a brain built from a unique combination of DNA. We do not choose our intelligence, emotional sensitivity or our stability. These core traits are handed to us before we even take our first breath.
And while life surrounds us with choices, how we react to those choices is just as predetermined.
The family we are born into, the experiences we are exposed to and the people we meet all impact the internal wiring we were given. Our interests, talents, fears and instincts develop not because we choose them freely, but because we are always going to respond to the world in a way that matches the person we were biologically destined to become.
It may feel like we have free will because we do not know what choice we will make until we make it, but when you really dig into each decision, you realize that each one is a result of a chain reaction.
The way your brain interprets each situation is shaped by experiences and genetics that you had no hand in choosing. What we think of as “choices” are really just the inevitable next steps in a story already set in motion by nature, circumstance and biology.
In this sense, fate is not some far-off concept controlled by Gods. It is personal. It is in the way we are made, the lives we are born into and the choices we think we are making. It is not out there, it is right here, living inside us, whether we like it or not.
Fate is not real:
But the more I sit with it, the more I wonder, maybe fate is not real at all. Maybe it is just a story we tell ourselves to cope with how unpredictable and unfair life can be.
If fate were real, if everything had already been decided, then what would be the point of anything? Why dream, why fight, why change? Every single day, people defy the odds, rewrite their stories and break cycles their families were stuck in for generations. If fate were pulling all the strings, how do we explain the moments when someone chooses something radically different than what anyone expected of them?
And when you strip everything else away, the answer is even simpler: you are human. That is it. You are a mammal, living on one tiny planet among millions, lucky enough to exist in a world that can support life. You are part of a species that evolved beyond mere survival. Capable of thinking, wondering, creating and changing. You are not a puppet controlled by fate. You are a living, breathing reminder that evolution chose possibility over certainty.
Blaming fate makes it easier to live with heartbreak. It softens the edges of loss. But it also takes away our power. Believing in free will means accepting that sometimes, horrible things happen for no reason at all. It means admitting that life is chaotic, messy and unfair, yet still choosing to live it anyway.
Maybe fate is not real. Maybe what is real is being flawed, scared, stubborn and brave enough to keep choosing, even when the world gives us every reason not to.
So what do you believe?
After arguing with myself, I am back at square one. Because the truth is, I do not know. And that is because no one will ever know. We spend our lives searching for answers, hoping to uncover some definitive truth, yet most of our questions remain mysteries.
In the end, what matters is not having the perfect answers. What matters is that we continue moving forward, making choices that feel right for you, even amidst the uncertainty. Life is fleeting; it can change in an instant. We often forget how fragile and unpredictable it is until we are reminded by sudden moments of loss, change or opportunity.
It does not matter what circumstances we were born into — privilege, hardship, stability, chaos — what matters is what we choose to do with the time and chances we are given. Whether or not our futures are already written, what is important is that we are here, right now, living.
It is about embracing existence for what it is. Imperfect, uncertain and beautiful.
In a world where nothing is promised and few things are clear, simply choosing to live, to grow and to stay true to yourself becomes the most meaningful answer of all.