Letter from the editor: Fortune telling
February 17, 2009 by Aimee Heckel
Filed under Letters from the Editors
It’s been a rough day. I crack open the fortune cookie. As if maybe –
“Your troubles will cease and fortune smile upon you.”
I groan. The words are yuckier than the stale cookie. If only it were as simple as a magic fortune. Or maybe it is — in part.
Confession: I used to make all of my major decisions based on a coin flip. I was so taken by the concept of “fate” that I relinquished my own desires, and with that, responsibilities. Ooh, that was the best part. I chose my college and sorority on a flip. I met my ex-husband on a bet. I met my best college friend when I advised her, the random girl in line behind me, to use the coin to make one of her biggest choices. It felt like freedom. My life was the definition of serendipity. One big plate of magic cookies.
Until about a year ago, when my coin flip betrayed me. It told me to leave my boyfriend. I flipped it again. Leave. Again. Leave. I hurled the coin out the window. I did not want to leave him.
That’s when I realized something. The coin flips had only worked in so far that they lined up with my true desires. In a way, they gave me permission to take what I already wanted. But if it didn’t work out, it wasn’t my fault. And if it did? Was it ever truly mine? Ouch.
Had I been connected with my own desires from the start, I would have already known what to do. And when probability inevitably handed me the unwanted side of the coin, I realized that I had the choice — to hand it back. Ultimately, I was always had control, even if I wanted to package it under the magical concept of serendipity.
You see, I don’t think serendipity equals blind faith. It’s not luck, and it’s not something you can “create.” It is where desire meets opportunity. If you want that job, and suddenly it opens up, the beauty is in that alignment: a 50-50 dance between you and the world around you.
As we dance through 2009, don’t be too obsessed with controlling things to miss the opportunities popping up all around you. But don’t lock your hungry eyes so far on the horizon that you overlook that which lies within you. You must know what you want to see it when it arrives.
The balance between control and chance touches every aspect of our lives: our relationships, careers, new year’s resolutions, weekend plans. That’s why it’s on our minds this month. We hope February’s articles help you with your own juggling act. Maybe you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for in these pages. Hey, you never know, right?
– Aimee
