Creating Versus Making
November 15, 2011 in Future
Trying to predict the future is fun and frustrating, fulfilling and distracting.
It is something everyone does, whether they realize it or not.
We do it when we say, “I will.” These two words, uttered by every person, in his or her own language at least once in life, are an attempt to predict the future.
Variations on this phrase include, you will, we will, they will, it will, and God will.
More often than not, attempts to predict the future are futile. We do it anyway. In fact, it is such a large part of our current society that I’ve dedicated an entire section of this website to the topic.
Some people think this is foolish, especially when predictions are a repeat of the same message that has been spouted for years. This is the message of a catastrophe that happens so that society can reboot. Many mythological and religious systems have this prophecy. Christians, Muslims, and New Agers, along with Hopis and other native cultures have some version of this. There is significant evidence that this happened in the past, either in the form of a great fire, maybe a nuclear blast, and/or a great flood. They reason that since it happened in the past, it will happen again in the future.
A more optimistic viewpoint is that the catastrophe doesn’t have to happen. Society will reboot on its own.
I find the discussion interesting. In addition, I believe there is substance to the topic, even when the predictions don’t happen as forecast. The discussions of the time to come help us get clear on what we want for the future.
My son Paul brought some insight to this when he started this week’s Monday with a question.
“Are we creating or making our lives?”
I responded by raising an eyebrow.
“You know, you can make a cake by following a recipe, copying what someone else has done or you can create it completely from scratch.”
At first glance, I didn’t see much of a difference. I looked deeper and noticed a vast difference.
Life gives us the opportunity to create our own futures through responding to situations. Instead, we look at what other people are saying and doing and try to make our future out of that. The problem with this practice is that what others are saying and doing is for THEM. We can’t take their futures and overlay them onto ours.
This is the frustrating and distracting part of looking at the future. We’re trying to make our future based on the ingredients given to other people.
The fun and fulfilling part is looking at how others do things and using our ingenuity and intuition to create our future, not copy what someone else is doing.
Of course, there is some overlap in seeing how other people create their future. Their futures may interact with ours. However, that overlap is only for us to consider, not for us to use to make ours. As I said before, that is frustrating and distracting.
It is OK to look at what other people say about the future. It is OK to learn from what others are doing about their futures. However, the only way you can plan for your future is to remain in this moment, in the midst of your love and creativity.
Since that’s the case, during the next article or two or three, I’m going to look at some of the predictions we’ve written about on this website. We will look at what was said, what the speakers claimed they meant, and the results.
I encourage you to examine those articles and see how that information will help you in preparing for what I believe will be a fun and fulfilling future.
Sheri said on November 15, 2011
That would explain why I got so frustrated as a kid with cooking! I was forced to MAKE things exactly as others had (recipe book, grandma, etc). I was not allowed to be creative. (I now “play with my food” and encourage my kids to do the same!) This had primarily to do with cooking, but indeed it relates to every area in life.
We can make friends (or lovers) or create loving relationships.
We can make a living or create a life.
In my opinion, it is far more pleasant and fun to create beautiful things and relationships than to try to make them based on patterns that much of society demands we live/make by.