I do not believe in fate. As a Christian, I trust that while my omniscient God knows the overall story and future outcome of my life (or my “destiny” as some may refer to it), He has given me the free will to choose the path of my life. Good decisions and actions in God’s eyes only have weight if people have the ability to choose and freely decide good over wrong. This premise of free will is the basis of my belief in choice over fate. Therefore, I leave nothing to fate. I wholeheartedly believe in hard work and self-determination as the keys to take control of one's life.
Though I do not believe in fate in the real world as previously explained, I do realize that authors sometimes use the idea of a fated life as literary devise in order to further the complexity and significance of their plots. In Sophacles' Oedipus Rex, the protagonist, Oedipus, seemingly has no control over his fate. The choices he make in order to avoid the prophetic curse that predicts him as the murderer of his father and the lover of his mother only lead to fulfill his curse. He leaves his supposed "family" in Corinth in order to stop the curse. However, upon his leave, he unknowingly kills his father, King Laius, after being somewhat provoked, and he later marries and has children with his mother. Ultimately, Oedipus is able to make choices, but they are meaningless; his life only has one option--his cursed fate.
Well said.
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