# Predetermined life
- URL: https://www.petrikajander.com/predetermined-life/
- Author: Petri Kajander
- Date: 2004-09-19
- Language: en

We want to be in control. We are not comfortable with unpredictability. We would prefer to live in a predictable, ordinary way, without any surprises. This is the underlying assumption in our behavior.

Predictable, controllable life, however, is an oxymoron. We hate to change, but on the other hand we long for excitement and thrills. We want to be positively surprised and experience something new and unknown. The ordinary life is a routine we do not like either, and we would prefer to get some excitement, but we want to choose when and the way it occurs— nothing too extreme and yet still new for us.

Sounds quite complicated? No, it is totally the opposite. Simply, we are just bored and scared to death. We want to cling to our perceptions of the world but still get some amusement when we have had enough of all the sameness. In other words, we like to live in our own well-thought-out world with all the nitty-gritty details and relations in nice little boxes and labels we have defined and predetermined.

Occasionally, we tire of the predetermined perception of the world and want a peek at the reality. But we do not want to see too much. It might destroy our sense of security and the wonderland we have formed in our mind. We are scared and out of balance when we cannot explain and understand something new or strange. This is especially the case with negative issues that happen in our life, whereas positive surprises are always welcome. We actually would prefer to get them almost all the time.

I must say that we are quite interesting creatures. We want to live in our own small sandboxes without any disturbance. Each person is the king of the hill, as long as he or she does not have to step down from his or her place on the hill and face the real world—the great unknown and the stage of all plays.