Growing up as a Mormon, I was probably more familiar with and thought more about the term “Free Agency” [1] than my non-Mormon peers. Once I reached my teens some of my peers did start to talk about “Free Agent status” relative to sports stars, but that is a bit different!
I really love that this had me thinking rather deep early in my life. But that deep thinking often kept coming to the same point about free agency. I would often think about why I would make one decision while another person would make a different decision.
Why why why?
First I have to admit I was one of those kids that did ask why quite a bit. But more than verbally asking, I wanted to figure things out. I love things mechanical and when I was quite young almost anything my parents would throw away, I would pull out of the trash and take it apart to figure out how it worked. Eventually I figured out how to occasionally fix some items. I was keenly curious and still am today.
I remember hearing a story in one of the church lessons about 2 brothers that had an alcoholic father. One turned out to be an alcoholic like his father, and one was sober and stayed away from alcohol altogether. They were both asked why they turned out like they did. Both sons answered the same, “What do you expect with a father like mine?” To me this didn’t help my young mind at all. I assume the intended moral of the story was that each of these sons made a choice. The alcoholic son simply made a bad choice and we just simply need to always make the right choice. I was fine with the right choice – I didn’t have a rebellious attitude. But my mind immediately wanted to know why one son made the bad choice and one made the good choice. I was taught that predestination wasn’t something we believed in, so that line of logic was a no go. I was also taught that, “He [God] knew not only what each of us could do, but what each of us would do when put to the test and when responsibility was given us.” So God decides what trial each person is going to be given. I learned that how we react to these trials will determine if they are damned or exalted. But I was also taught God already knows if it is a trial beyond our means to resist. If he never gives us a temptation we can’t resist, then why are some people unable to resist the temptation?
Then I learned that before we were born, even before we became “spirits” we were “intelligences.” OK. So why is one intelligence formed in such a way that they become Mother Teresa and another becomes Adolf Hitler?
No matter how much I kept digging to find the answer, I couldn’t shake that it seemed that God made one son able to make the right choice and one other was not able to make the right choice. My young mind keep focusing on fairness. That fairness fixation probably comes from the fact that I have a lot of siblings and we certainly had love mixed in with “survival of the fittest”. If you didn’t get seconds quickly at the dinner table, you didn’t get any seconds.
In Mormonism we love to make judgments about actions even before this life. For most of Mormonism entire races were deemed to be “slackers in the pre-earth life”. And it wasn’t limited to just certain races. Valiance in the pre-earth life determined if you would be sent into a body with mental handicaps and/or even to a less desirable country. That sure feels good for a person born in a prosperous country and with no mental/physical issues. And if you were also born into a family that was a member of the one true church, how could someone not feel like, “Dang, I must have been really good!”?
Choices and Consequences
As I got older I was taught that, “You can make a choice, but you can’t choose the consequences”. This made sense and for a while helped me answer my question of why individuals were either good or bad at making the right major decisions in life. We are the result of the decisions we make. Sounds right.
Just like in a game of chess, one move limits the future possible moves going forward. So mentally pulling that thread a bit led me back to the same question. The only difference wasn’t focusing on the big life decisions, but instead the question focused on why some people make the right “little” choices early in life that set them up to make the right big choices in life. So after a while this only kicked the same question down the road to these smaller decisions earlier in life, but essentially it was still the same question. Why did God make one person able to make the small early decisions correctly while someone else just couldn’t resist grabbing a cookie from the cookie jar when mom wasn’t looking and setting themselves up to be an ax-murderer 20 years down the line. And if God knew Johnny couldn’t resist taking that cookie, then it didn’t seem like God was just.
It gets more complicated
In the last few years I have been digging into the science of the brain and human behavior. I have become fascinated with it. I did a post a few months ago about The Self-Righteous Mind. Since reading that book, there are several stories that have had me thinking about free agency again.
Story #1 – The Doctor made me do it
Just the other day I listened to a RadioLab podcast that told a story about a man that suffered from epilepsy. He had an operation performed that physically separated parts of his brain and this helped him to be near seizure-free. Seizure-free until one day he woke up in a wrecked car and he realized that he had another seizure while driving. So he had the operation again and once again it seemed to help. The only issue was that he became hyper-sexual, including downloading child porn. Lots of it. He indicated that it was such a compulsion that he would download specific child pornography, delete it because he knew he didn’t want it, then download it again. He would do this over and over and over again for hours some nights. The feds eventually found him. But a doctor claims that it was the surgery that caused this and this behavior has been replicated in other primates when they have this same operation.
Story #2 – The remedy is worse than the disease.
Many of you may have heard the story of Suzy Favor Hamilton (see ABC’s 20/20) Her early life could probably be summed up as a very normal girl that was an exceptionally gifted runner. But she did have some emotional issues that kept tripping her up when the pressure was on. She went all the way up to competing in the Olympics where she collapsed and pretended to pass out. A few years after her Olympic appearance she was diagnosed as bipolar. She was given medication that seemed to really help, especially keeping the depression under control. But the medicine apparently altered her in other ways. She ended up leaving her very young daughter and seemingly good solid husband because she had an insatiable desire to be the best high-end escort in Las Vegas. This was a sudden and dramatic shift in her behavior. Eventually she went off that medicine and those urges went away.
Story #3 – So now you know what it is like to be a teenage boy
An acquaintance related how she had some post-menopausal issues so she was referred to an Endocrinologist to receive hormone therapy. As usual it takes some adjusting the hormones levels to fit the person’s body. So she was going in weekly doctor visits. One week she quickly noticed after the doctor’s visit that she was full of energy. Oddly she went from her traditional role of wanting sex much less frequent than her husband to wanting it much more than he could even tolerate.
She mentioned this on the next visit to the doctor and he looked over her chart and said, “Oops, Looks like I added an extra zero at the end of the amount of testosterone I wanted the nurse to give you. So how did you like your week of being a teenage boy?” She realized that she had subconsciously felt judgmental towards her teenage sons and couldn’t figure why they couldn’t just keep their mind off girls and sex. After this she felt quite a bit more for her teenage sons.
Story #4 – I changed my mind, or was my mind changed?
I heard Neil deGrasse Tyson mention in passing that he had a friend that was transgender and decided to go through the process of sex reassignment. The procedures were started that would lead up to the physical sex-change surgery. Neil’s friend said that just after they started the hormone therapy said that the shocking part was how much this had a mental and emotional effect and stated, “I no longer believe humans have free will.”
So …
Questions:
- What role does free will play in our lives, physically and spiritually?
- How do hormones, physiological changes in the brain, and other neurological factors alter our ability to exercise free will?
- Are there other experiences like the ones above that make you think deeply about free will?
[1] This was before correlation started pushing for the term “agency”. I am not sure why, but I guess the correlation committee has free agency to call it what ever they want.
A bonus to anybody that got the pun with the picture at the top. It is a “freewheel!” One of the main parts of a “multi-speed” (i.e. “10 speed”) bicycle. It is what allows you to stop peddling while the bike is moving and not have the peddles continue to turn.
Last time I taught ss, there was an asterick by agency in the manual that said we should not call it ,FREE agency, just agency. Is the term evolving or undergoing Mormon reconstruction?
To bounce of Jay’s comment, my understanding is that they did have a clarification on whether “free agency” is appropriate, and my understanding is that you can say “free will”, or you can say “agency” or even “moral agency”, but you shouldn’t say “free agency.”
What was the reason for it? Well, Happy Hubby actually gets at it:
So, the term “agency” or “moral agency” is meant to clarify that even though you have choices you can freely make (“free will”), as an agent, your choices have consequences that you are not free from, but to the contrary, you are responsible for.
OK, so with that aside, I’ll make a few more comments on thoughts I had throughout.
1. As bizarre as this might be, I had a lengthy discussion online where someone said they were raised as a Calvinist/deterministic Mormon. This was bizarre to me because I always took as a baseline that Mormonism is a denomination that is most committed to free will, but this person argued that there’s enough inconsistency that one could make a case either way. I don’t necessarily want to go into all the details they offered, just wanted to point out that this was a recent conversation I had and it was just very strange for me to be trying to defend Mormonism’s free will position.
2. Early on, HH says
Keep in mind that within Mormonism, a) the intelligences are eternal, b) the nature of the intelligences doesn’t foreordain or predestine action, and c) God doesn’t have a whole lot of say in affecting those two things. So, ultimately the co-eternality of the intelligences is meant to be a way of further supporting the idea that free will/moral agency goes all the way down. One intelligence is not “formed” in such a way that they become Mother Teresa, etc., because intelligences are not formed, and intelligences aren’t destined to become either a Mother Teresa or a Hilter.
And additionally, God doesn’t “make” one son able to make the right choice and the other not — at least, not within a Mormon framework. (This kind of questioning is reasonable to ask of a creatio ex nihilo God, but doesn’t fit in Mormonism .)
to me, the Mormon justification of this-world consequences on pre-mortal actions is an attempt to make even the random circumstances of this life into the consequences of free will.
3. That being said, you raise a lot of good empirical points. The whole creatio ex nihilo vs organized from existing intelligences discussion is tentative and theological, but we can still talk about where the rubber hits the world in the world that we actually see. And as you point out, it does appear from an empirical standpoint that will is mediated and moderated by one’s body (neurology, biology, chemistry, etc.,) I personally agree that this problematizes simplistic notions of free will, and the question is whether what is “left” can still count as free will.
IMO the idea that God gives us trials should not be taught, same with the teaching that God will never give us more than we can handle. Some folks are burdened with trials no one could handle. This is why we have grace and community, but even the best will succumb. God didn’t give a child the trial of child molestation. My belief is that trials such as these are the result of living in a fallen world, something we signed up for in order to live on earth, messy as it is. I doubt a 17th century slave separated from their family would say they were given a trial that God knew they’d endure. Otherwise those in the highest tiers of the church must be some of the weakest souls created.
The two brothers with the alcoholic father were likely both genetically predisposed to alcoholism. One brother probably made a poor choice as a youngster to indulge while the other didn’t which led to trials larger in comparison to any deserved consequence for the initial indulgences.
You post is great and highlights that simple teachings re: consequences and agency will encourage people to make good choices, but deeper reflection proves it isn’t always (and likely most often) quite so simple.
When my young daughter comments on someone smoking, I talk to her about addiction and how difficult it must be for that person and encourage her to never try it lest she fall in the same unhealthy trap. Compassion can be a missing part of our conversations . In my line of work I interact with some of the poorest in our society. Many have made bad choices and not surprisingingly so (and often predictably) given the hand they were dealt. I don’t know the answer to what all of this means. But I know many of us are quite priveledged and wouldn’t be surprised if we’re judged more harshly than the least among us.
Also: sex drive and teens, it isn’t just the boys (:
I think Andrew’s explanation for the change in using free agency is a little too thoughtful. My understanding is that the phrase was changed because it’s redundant, if one has agency then by definition she is free to use it. By the way, at the dawn of LDS blogs this was one of the pet peeves of many of the young and educated blog commenting mormons embarrassed by their church, “Why do we insist on showing ourselves to be such rubes? Agency means being free, duh!” So it’s kind of funny to be reading mildly peeved comments about it being changed as an indication of our lack of sophistication 15 years later.
I’ve had alternating phases in my life when I’ve really tried to answer the questions the post raises and when I’ve thought it really wasn’t worth worrying about too much. The times when it’s bothered me the most is when I’d identified a behavior in myself I really wanted to change, and found it nigh-impossible to do so. Repentance never seems as straight forward in real life as it does in Sunday School. Just changing the way one interacts with spouse or children can be so difficult because we have our personalities, and they don’t seem particularly malleable.
I’m currently in a tired phase, and my conclusion is that agency is simply the ability to choose within the circumstances we’re given. The circumstances limit what choices are available, and which are easy and which are hard. These circumstances include hormones and mental illness as much as wealth, health, or physical incarceration. I also believe the circumstances play into what degree choices can be considered moral (I guess I believe in a degree of moral relativism). I absolutely believe that human beings have agency to make choices and that the choices we make play into what we become, but I also believe that our circumstances (again, the sum total of all our opportunities and limitations) put a ceiling on that, meaning that divine grace is absolutely necessary. Agency, or choice, introduces an element of randomness to the universe, and exercising choice affects the circumstances of ourselves and others going forward.
The University of Texas tower shooter, Charles Whitman, felt compelled to shoot people. He wrote in some papers found after the shootings that he needed his brain examined to find out what was wrong. Yes indeed, a small tumor was found in his brain during an autopsy. Did Whitman have free will?
Chauncey Riddle who taught philosophy at BYU in the 70s and 80s was very Calvinist. He believed we had freedom to become what we were.
The thread goes back a ways.
The question is whether people can transform or do they only evolve? Comes up in many contexts.
Bishop Bill,
The argument could be made that Whitman exercised free will by pulling the trigger instead of seeking help. If he was experiencing compulsion, but the reasoning part of his brain knew it was wrong, then yes he made a terrible choice. Certainly depending on the degree of his urges (related to location of the tumor) the choice may have been quite difficult.
This is one of my favorite philosophical subjects. I always relate it to time travel. If someone knew what action you would take, because they observed it, would that invalidate your freedom to make that choice? People tend to stop right at “foreknowledge excludes free will”, but I don’t think it’s that simple. It’s like our entire lives are an infinite series of Schrödinger.
Course, this also ties in to my difficulty understanding quantum mechanics and how computers can work with something being true and not true at the same time.
To the bonus – I recently came across a newer use of the freewheel; most automobiles now have one on the alternator, keeping it from pushing the engine while decelerating. Evidently is improves mpg and wear and tear on the engine.
There are absolutely Calvinist Mormons out there, and they do believe strongly that they are justified in seeing Mormonism as deterministic. They’ll cite the scripture about spirits being pre-ordained to be leaders as evidence of pre-destination. Honestly, Saturday’s Warrior didn’t help much either. It’s riddled with non-doctrinal bosh that has seeped into the collective unconscious of our congregations.
Personally, I don’t know what to make of the biological factors that so clearly alter how people act and react. The science doesn’t always match the doctrine on this one, and I think we still don’t fully understand it. One way to look at it is something an executive coach once said that I often repeat. He said that you need to believe that every situation is 100% in your control even though it’s not true because to believe anything else erodes your effectiveness.
I think free will is a total myth and false doctrine as well. The purpose of life (as taught in the Temple) is to “learn by our own experience to distinguish good from evil.” Nothing more or less. We are simply here to experience these principles directly and first hand and thereby become “like the gods.” I think the idea of a loving Father torturing us to see if we will remain loyal and “choose the right” is ludicrous. This is a learning process, not a testing process.
Your choices are the product of brain chemistry, genetic predisposition, environment, childhood, physical health and circumstances. So no, you are not “free”. I agree with Martin, if I understood correctly, you have a very limited window of choices.
KLC,
I would love to be take credit for that thoughtfulness, but church leaders have definitely spoken about the change in terminology. This 2014 New Era article is pretty new, but it walks through leader statements from the past that have used “moral agency” https://www.lds.org/new-era/2014/10/free-agency-or-moral-agency?lang=eng
Granted, the church has used “free agency” for far more years than it has just “agency” or “moral agency,” but the reasoning that I have summarized isn’t 100% brand new. Even as early as a 2003 BYU devotional from Pres. Uchtdorf had the argument that
Andrew, thanks for the response and links, I learned something new.
Great post! I am a big football fan, and have considered doing a post on brain injuries of football players. Some of these injuries manifest in suicide, homicide, drug use, etc, and it seems that these injuries can affect free agency. Leigh Steinberg tells of working with Steve Young and Troy Aikman. Both quarterbacks had big problems with concussions, and he was concerned for their well-being. Leigh said something about Troy Aikman asking the same questions repeatedly after a concussion knocked him from a game. “Did we win? Did I play well?” over and over. He said it scared him how brain injuries can impact a person. We may not have as much free agency as we think.
I believe in free will. I choose to do so. To me, adopting a no-free-will-we-are-slaves-to-biology-or-environment approach would deny far too much that is precious, including the whole Gospel message. So I believe we are free to play the cards we are dealt. Some get poor hands, some get great hands. We do the best we can. Isn’t that the moral of the parables of the talents and the pounds? God will be gracious.
I like what ji says:
“We are free to play the cards we are deal. Some get poor hands, some get great hands.”
I think that real difference is…how much of life is determined by the hands we have, and how much is determined by bluffing, reading other players, etc.,?
Great thoughts and comments. Seriously pondered over these same questions throughout my life, and incidentally listened to that same podcast. I’ve come to a lot of conclusions as well, and it has changed my view of life and the plan of salvation. Not sure I have anything I want to add to the discussion immediately save to point out the determinism and free will are not mutually exclusive. I would argue in fact that any meaningful free will is dependent on a degree of determinism – otherwise there can be no free will at all (i.e. the “I/will” must be able to cause/determine “x, y, or z”, otherwise the “will” is not responsible for the outcome)
Another variation on this is personality types, as described by Hawkgirl http://www.mormonmatters.org/2009/05/23/bloggernacle-personality-survey/
In Australia we are having a voluntary postal survey, conducted by the conservative government on whether to legalise gay marriage. Many of the obedience type members are out on face book particularly as conservatives OK to vote no.
There does not seem to be much thought/reasoning involved in their position, but there is an assumption that that is what the church expects.
I read the church position on gay marriage, which I was assured explained the doctrine, and policy, and it made no sense to me.
I have come to the conclusion that politically conservative people think very differently to how I do.
The church where I live is very much controlled by the conservative/obedience view. With this public discussion on I would like to question some of the assumptions and facts that fact check as wrong, but my temple recommend needs renewing in October, and any questioning would be interpreted as not supporting leaders.
I’ll continue to use the “play the hand we’re dealt” analogy ji and Andrew discussed earlier. I think we are free to play the hand we are dealt but this mortal life can affect the cards we have in our hand. Sometimes genetics, other people exercising their agency, our place of birth, or any number of seemingly random things can affect the cards in our hand. Ultimately, we have to choose how to play those cards.
Something else I’d like to bring up coincides with the idea of intelligences and the pre-mortal life. Joseph Smith, in his King Follett sermon, says this:
If that is true, then we were independent beings in the pre-mortal life. If that is the case, then from what source did God derive his authority over us? It seems that one can only obtain authority two ways: 1) Take it; or 2) Be granted that authority by those over whom you will have authority. I would argue that God’s authority is derived from the latter; we gave him that authority. If that is the case, then I think it illustrates just how important to God our free will is and why the concepts in D&C 121 are so powerful.
Maybee
I believe that God will never give you more than you can handle but I believe that it’s possible to make choices where you bring upon yourself stuff that you cannot handle
It matters why. Here an excerpt from my musings journal:
Theoretical/Philosophical:
(Quantum mechanics) At some fundamental Plank-length level the universe is probabilistic.
(Contra based on scale) At every scale that we can imagine affects consciousness, the universe appears to be deterministic.
(Contra-contra based on failure) I know with any degree of confidence required that my memory fails. In fact my memory is a total hash. Which means that the conditions required for determinism in my life are falsified. God may know all about me, but I don’t know all about me and never will. My decisions and choices in the present are made in an inescapable haze of forgetfulness and uncertainty. In short, I have agency because I’m not smart enough to be determined.
Self-control:
It is a common observation that people think they have agency. Think they make real decisions. In a self-referential way that is enough to decide how I should think about my conscious decisions. It doesn’t really matter what the ultimate truth is. To whatever degree I think I’m in charge, I should take responsibility and act like it.
Judgment:
If I held to a retributive theory of judgment, I’d have some work to do (agency or not gets tied up in blame and punishment). But because I’m a pragmatist and believe in rehabilitation and prevention and other pragmatic models of judgment, the ultimate truth about agency is irrelevant. It makes perfect sense to work with each individual’s perception or understanding of their degree of agency.
Common sense:
Most of us most of the time feel like we make real choices. But not always. We know people with compulsions. We very likely experience some compulsion somewhere in our life. Not all the time in every situation, but somewhere.
[Examples from among my friends and myself]
>If I take a first drink, then I will take the second.
>If I open the magazine I will keep flipping the pages.
>If I am criticized I will get depressed.
>If I step in front of an audience I will panic.
To say “get over it” or “don’t be like that” does no good. It is not in ‘my’ control. ‘I’ can decide not to take the first drink, not to pick up the magazine. ‘I’ can learn coping mechanisms when a panic attack presents. ‘I’ can say no to the Sacrament Meeting talk. It’s not easy. It’s not obvious. It may be the work of a lifetime and beyond. On the other hand, I don’t have much choice in the matter (intentional). It does seem pretty clear (hence “common sense”) that denial doesn’t work and white knuckling doesn’t work. Not very well. Not for the long run.
Very cool concept Cody, D+C 121 always been very important part of what little testimony remains to me, thanks for the reminder of the cosmic nature of God we have at times in the history of the church, as opposed to the God of Lost Car Keys.
I really had trouble with this for a while and sometimes still do (agency, will, etc). At issue, in large part, is the assignment of accountability. If you find yourself at a disadvantage due to something that seems outside your control, there’s a sense of intense powerlessness (even, horror/terror) that can result. I think this is doubly so when you’re unfairly “held to account” by others instead of accounting to nature, natural law, etc.
There’s a difference between the consequences of coming too close to the edge of a cliff and inadvertently falling vs answering to a decision imposed by a jury, a “court of public opinion, ” and the like. The nature of the consequences is different. The cliff is objective, but it’s consequences beyond a point can be very grave, very final, and they leave little room for argument. With decisions based on others’ opinions, bias can be decreased but not eliminated. However, minds, often with difficulty, can change. Decisions may last a long time, but they’re probably not final. Even if it’s small, the decisions of others usually leave space for reflection, action/adjustment, hope, a paradigm shift. Many people favor the humanity of these decisions over the finality of natural ones. It just depends.
Looking at the distinction as described, I’m not sure one way of accounting is inherently better than the other. As in Angela C, though, believing you have no influence robs you of the impetus to take action, play the odds, even if they’re small. Whether or not you believe decision is illusion, the pragmatic reality seems to be that you’re always deciding something. Not deciding can only be described as deciding not to decide (or not deciding anything-death). As far as the hand one is dealt, being grateful for a chance to play leaves the possibility of good experiences open and also allows for gratitude for the game.
“I believe that God will never give you more than you can handle but I believe that it’s possible to make choices where you bring upon yourself stuff that you cannot handle”
Sure I can see how poor choices lead to unbearable situations. But I stand by my stance that God does not give people trials. A God that purposefully allows terrible things to happen to people, especially children, isn’t the God I know. The effects of abuse on children are well researched and significant and certainly “more than they can handle.” God didn’t do that.
Maelstrom,
In Mormondom we tend to clasp onto oversimplified catch phrases. But before we put these statements on our wall in cute vinyl lettering, we should be sure there’s truth behind the words. The phrase “God will never give us more than we can handle” was not given over the pulpit by a prophet. It’s a somewhat dangerous concept. Depressed individuals may not seek professional help, individuals may not rely on friends during a trial, etc. all because they feel they should be able to handle it, because God knew they could handle it, right? Maybe if we stopped ascribing to this way of thinking we’d rely on each other more, seek help sooner, and support programs to help buoy up the marginalized.
There’s an article in the Deseret News that explores this topic:
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865594653/God-will-give-you-more-than-you-can-handle–I-guarantee-it.html
Can cough medicine make you lose your free-agency? https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/north-carolina-man-charged-wife-s-murder-told-911-he-n798981
Interesting MH. Back about 10 years ago a news reporter in SLC was heavy on the cold meds and signed off with, “I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ amen!” Maybe not free will, but at least in this case everyone got a laugh out of it.
Angela says, “He said that you need to believe that every situation is 100% in your control even though it’s not true because to believe anything else erodes your effectiveness.”
That pretty well sums up my position, I guess. I don’t know what to think about all of the other things that affect my choices, except to say that they get thrown into the decision-making hopper with everything else. The fact that we see “through a glass darkly” doesn’t mean we aren’t making choices.
I also believe that a merciful and all-knowing God will take those factors into account at my judgment. So I try to do the best I can, exercising what I think is agency (“free agency” is redundant; that’s the only reason for the footnote). Sin is, after all, knowingly acting against the will of God.
Personally, I’m a proponent of the “it’s not the hand you’re dealt, it’s how you play the cards” viewpoint. I don’t believe that God gave me or anyone else trials on purpose to test or refine me, although those things do serve those purposes. I think I’ll be judged on what I did and why I did it, or why I thought I did it, which (metaphysics and brain chemistry aside) amounts to the same practical thing.
I also like the cards analogy. However, I don’t like the idea of assuming you are in control 100% of the time just so you can be more effective. That might be fine for someone who is mentally healthy, but it’s a recipe for disaster if you have mental illness, like me. Survival sometimes depends on you recognizing that you are *not* in control. That’s what Maybee’s been trying to point out. You can do a lot of damage if you don’t take into account the possibility you might need outside help.
I think a major challenge in this life is to recognize what we have control over and what we don’t, and trying to act responsibly with that information.
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