Live life

Why am I here? This is a question that any human being has probably asked themselves more than once.  It’s easy just to get caught up in everyday monotony and just go on living life like we always do.  Sometimes, I feel like I live my life for the weekend, a break from the craziness of the week.  I feel like every Monday I get up (really early), go to work than school, than sometimes work again, go for a run, eat something, do some homework, go to bed, read, and then wake up the next morning and do it all over again.  The only difference is, I am thinking, “it’s only Tuesday, great not even half way done yet.”  Do we have a purpose on this earth? Are our missions or assignments just to live?  I happen to have a faith in a God that put me on this earth to love Him and others, and trust that he will lead me through my life by guiding me through decisions.  There are so many other reasons in which people believe they are put on this earth.  Some say their futures are predetermined, others think that it all happens due to chance or being at the right place at the right time.  As I’m writing this, I am realizing that sometimes I think the two different ideals overlap.  Is it possible that life can be a mixture of both fate and predestination?  Even when I believe in a God who has, in my opinion, given me free will to make my own choices, but at the same time has a plan for me….so is that both?

The character in Bharati Mukherjee’s novel, Jasmine, seems to struggle with the same questions.  Jasmine is an Indian woman who has escaped India and moved to America to find her new identity.  From the beginning of the novel, it is obvious that Jasmine does not believe that her life is predestined.  She has an astrologer foretell her future, but she decides he’s a “crazy old man” (p. 3).  Jasmine has made a future for herself by leaving India to fulfill her murdered husbands desire to move to America.  When she arrives in New York she lives with a family as an au pair and discusses the issue of predestination with Taylor.  She remembers when her father was killed by a bull in a freak accident.  A friend tries to console Jasmine’s mother by saying, “Crying is selfish. We have no husbands, no wives, no fathers, no sons. Family life and family emotions are all illusions..” (p 59). As I read this, I wondered if Jasmine would agree with this. It’s quite a bold statement to make.  She goes on to say\ “The Lord lends us a body, gives us an assignment, and sends us down.  When we get the job done, when Lord calls us home again for the next assignment” (p. 59).

Is that what life is about? Assignments?  Does every person just live to complete their mission or assignment? Even Taylor wonders what Jasmine thinks, “You don’t believe that, do you? You can’t, you’re too modern for that” (p 59).  I think that even though Jasmine has seemingly abandoned her Indian ideals, she still believes that we have a purpose on this earth.  To have a purpose doesn’t necessarily mean that your life is predetermined.  What’s interesting is that she goes on to talk about how her father died and if his “assignment was to die in a freakish accident before he could marry me off so that I could be free to fall in love with Prakash” (p. 59).  She continues with all different scenarios that her father’s assignment could have been.  Each assignment may seem really small, but still it’s an assignment.  “Why shouldn’t our mission be infinitesimal?  Aren’t all lives, viewed that way, equally small” (p 70)?  It’s true, no matter how we may feel, our lives are just as important as the next persons.  It doesn’t matter how big our small.  She talks about having a mission of just moving a flowerpot from one table to another may be a person’s assignment.  Taylor responds by saying, “I couldn’t live in world like yours, if rearranging a particle of dust is as important as discovering relativity…where’s the incentive to do anything” (p. 60)?  My favorite line of this discussion Jasmine has with Taylor is this, “The incentive, I should have said, is to treat every second of your existence as a possible assignment from God.  Everything you do, if you’re a physicist of a caregiver, is equally important in the eyes of God” (p 61).

This is a perfect way to end her thoughts on how life is determined.  I don’t think that she really has a firm opinion on whether or not her life is set out for her because she knows that she can make choices that will change her life.  No one can tell her that her life will only amount to a certain thing because she may have already done something that affected her assignment.  “If the universe is one room known only to one God, then God only knows how to furnish it, how to populate it” (p. 61).  Jasmine doesn’t sound upset at this, she just realizes that someone else is in control, but she is able to make her own decisions.

If I’m interpreting this right, I think that Jasmine and I agree.  If we live life as if every moment is a gift from God and part of our life on this earth, not only will we live a happier life, but I think that we would move closer to the path in which God has made for us.  There is a very fuzzy line that separates fate and destiny.  All I know is that I don’t really want to go on with my life “living for the weekend” and not realize that I’m only given a short time on this earth and should make the best of it.