Fortune-telling

From astrology, poker and The Book of Changes to computer “fortune slot machines,” there are hundreds of ways to tell fortunes. Indeed. Whether lovers are still eying and guessing each other or are on the verge of breaking up, they go to temples, ask medium friends, or interpret some apocalyptic sights and happenings in their lives, hoping to settle the uncertainty to know what is and what will be. And yes, everyone of us, to some extent, has to see the future in order to decide which way to choose, what to do. Yet, if fortune telling can be one hundred percent exact and correct, will you still go to a fortune teller? Knowing your future in advance is not necessarily an advantage. Learning that bad things will happen to you will make you nervous and upset. For example, if the prediction is that on your way to school tomorrow there will be an accident in which you’ll be slightly scraped, then wouldn’t you be trapped in a state of horror and worry the whole day today? If you want to do something to prevent it, then there will be even more sound and fury. Wouldn’t it be better that you aren’t aware of it at all? On a larger scale, to know too many things for certain is to strip one self of the pleasure of life. We human beings dwell on illusions. Slight expectations and hopes constitute a large part of our happiness. In Dante’s Inferno, the most horrible thing is the loss of hope. No matter what adversity we are in right now, it is still endurable as long as there is hope. One thing that makes death so terrible is that we can have no illusion about it. Therefore, thank goodness there are no miraculous fortune tellers to tell us everything. The best thing to do is to grasp every moment, make the most of it according to our own plans, and look forward to the harvest of surprise. Why don’t we look at fortune telling as an occasion for deeper thinking and consideration, at those predictions as advice? We shall then have full control over own lives.