A mistake in my published writing has been the emphasis on man's possession of free will. I did this deliberately to counteract the common impression that Oriental mystical teaching is associated with a paralysing fatalism and a futile inertia. Unfortunately, I overdid it. Consequently, I gave the impression that the quantity of free will we possess is about equal to or even more than the quantity of fate allotted to us. But, in their combination, the effects of our past, the pattern of our particular nature, and the influence of our environment govern our immediate actions very largely whilst the divine laws govern our ultimate direction within the universe quite fully. In such a situation, personal freedom must actually be less than we usually believe it to be. Again I have taught that no experience could come to us which we had not earned by our karma, which in turn was entirely the product of our free-will. But I have since discovered that some experiences can come to us solely because we need them, not at all because we earn them. This is an important difference. It increases the sphere of personal fate and diminishes the sphere of personal freedom. However, in self-justification I ought to point out three things here about the kind of fatalism now put forward. First it is not paralysing but, on the contrary, inspiring. For it tells us that there is a divine plan for us all and that true freedom lies in willingly accepting that infinitely wise and ultimately benevolent plan. Second, it emphatically offers no grounds for inertia for it bids us work with the plan--not only to secure our own individual happiness but also to help secure the common welfare of all. Third, it does not introduce anything arbitrary or despotic into God's will for us but retains the rule of intelligent purpose and restores evolutionary meaning to the general picture of our individual lives. If quite often the free will we imagine we are exercising does not exist outside such imagination, this need make no difference to our practical attitude towards life. It does not stop us from getting the best (in the philosophic sense) out of life. And it only reassures us that in deserting the herd and taking to the spiritual path we are putting whatever freedom we do possess to the most sensible use. Although I must henceforth correct the balance of my personal work and stress the inevitability of things, I know that in urging aspirants in the past to liberate themselves from the lower nature through exercising the consciousness of their higher self and its knowledge, I pointed to the only real freedom worth having and within reach. The mass of humanity exists in the deepest slavery, often unconsciously. All talk of exercising free will whilst chains clank round its thought and feeling and action, is unreal if not self-deceptive.
-- Notebooks Category 9: From Birth to Rebirth > Chapter 4 : Free Will, Responsibility, and The World-Idea > # 13
