Imagine

As of writing this, I’m currently forty-seven years old. It’s been roughly thirty-five years since I first questioned a big part of how the world works. The people who know me might say I’m a bit of a perfectionist, and they might also say I’m a bit of a problem solver. Pretty much ever since I was twelve, I saw a problem and I wanted to fix it.

For thirty-five years, I’ve felt like I’ve been rehearsing—finding my voice, finding the right words. Maybe it’s finally ready.

Maybe my desire to fix things, to care, to make the world a better place comes from my early religious background, my exposure to stories with heroes, or simply the culmination of everything. I know some of you will feel threatened and may resist what I’m saying, but I promise you, my intentions are good

In my ideal world, most people will adopt determinism, and determinism will eventually beat out the illusion of free will. Over time—across many generations—it will become the default state. We won’t have to force the idea or the behavior anymore. I do think we would still have to isolate certain individuals, but we would treat them differently. We would treat everyone differently, including ourselves. We might not know the full picture, but we would have an understanding of why something occurs or why a person is who they are.

It doesn’t mean people can’t change—people change no matter what. But the cost of endless blame, judgment, and the refusal or lack of understanding goes far beyond wasted time and energy. On a personal level, it keeps us trapped in bitterness and resentment. On a larger scale, viewing our differences as threats or inherent flaws is what drives hostility, division, and ultimately war.

When we stop viewing individual behavior as the sole outcome of the individual and see it for what it truly is—a complex chain of events—we strip away all those unnecessary consequences that come with it.

Think of how much room we would have if we cleared out all that waste—the wasted time, the wasted energy, the unnecessary suffering. We wouldn’t even need to completely understand why everything is the way it is. We could fill that new void with things that actually matter and make more sense.

You may say that I’m a dreamer, but I know—although I can’t be certain—I’m not the only one.