At this time of every year, after the revelry, dancing and rejoicing has subsided, a great many withdraw to their closets to invite themselves into deep contemplation. Questions are asked privately and answers are kept to oneself: how did I fare in the year that has just passed? How much of set goals were achieved in the said year? What has the New Year in store, what are the new goals? What then follows is the accustomed New Year Resolution. As it is with individuals so is it with governments, tearing open the parcel containing their statements of intentions. The individuals pray for help and strength to fulfill their New Year resolutions. Many a smoker wishes and resolves to give up smoking, some others drinking. From experiences of many people, no sooner is a resolution made than it is broken. It is an unceasing struggle of man with himself. The solution is not in giving up, but in the ardent longing and continuous working at it. In so doing, the resolution receives reinforcement from currents of life and man receives help. These are a group of people who have given serious thought to life and have come to believe that there is more to life than the ephemeralities mostly on display. The majority among us, it would seem, are unmoved even in the face of the chaos and confusion assailing the world.

Man is the architect of his own fortune. As he prepares his bed so does he lie on it. These are profound statements which hint at the profound truths of life. We also have the statement that he who fails to plan plans to fail. They are all parts of the same truth expressed differently. We may be wondering how these are related to New Year resolutions. Resolutions are plans for goals firmly grounded, the application of which makes man the architect of his own fate. How each person is the architect of his own fortune or how he prepares his bed is not often comprehensible especially with regards to material application. This is the reason why a man knocked down by unrelenting blows of fate is wont to ask, “Where is justice?”

What returns as blows of fate are simply reactions to resolutions of which activities are a nexus and from which they flow—or from no resolutions at all. Since there is no standstill in life non-resolutions themselves are resolutions which attract consequences. What I am getting at is that what returns as blows of fate are simply reactions of one’s own activities in time gone past, time he hardly remembers because he measures man from his birth to his death. And since an onlooker has not observed or caught him with wrong-doing, he comes to the conclusion of the so-called injustice in the world. In his frame of mind, he is swayed by the arguments of advocates of say revolution that the existing system in whatever country must be overturned to give way to the new where all will have equal opportunities and social justice. Yet, well-meaning as the struggle for social justice and equal opportunities is, it is borne out of ignorance. What exists is offer of equal opportunities but not equal opportunities. What each person does with the offer in accordance with his free will determines the opportunities available to him and his state in life.

Let’s pause a minute to consider the following: What should be expected of a man who has no goal triggered by resolutions? What should be expected of a man manifestly depraved, totally evil, a terror in the neighbourhood who kills, plunders at will, one who takes pleasure in banditry or rejoicing in kidnapping seeing it as an achievement and there is no one strong enough or willing to call his bluff and halt his atrocities? He is influential and connected in the circle of the mighty and the powerful. He has enormous resources to buy his way to escape justice from the courts. Suddenly, one day, he dies naturally. Before his death, despite his atrocities, the proverbial long arms of the law did not catch up with him. If all were to end with his demise, doubts will justifiably arise in the minds of right thinking people in the justice of the Creator. Consider a nation who pushes for war, or a leader who is confident in his invincibility by surrounding himself with men of weapon and valour and rides roughshod over those thought not to be so comparatively equipped and commentators push for war through speeches, and even thoughts. Will it be injustice if they were made to experience what they so ardently yearn for in the future or in other earth lives? How can people ask and assiduously work for and promote war, and at the same time pray that no war should come, and when it arrives, it should be quickly ended, especially when the trend is not as promising as expected and since it is the innocent men who suffer in the outbreak of hostilities? Will that not amount to a mockery of justice of the Creator?

People abuse trust. Workers cheat employers. Employers cheat employees. The driver is dishonest. The mistress in the home oppresses and enslaves the house-helps. They are permitted neither sleep nor freedom. There are reports of some househelps being bathed with boiling water in the rage of the mistress. She considers them to be a set of inferior people. Lagos inhabitants disregard traffic rules with reckless abandon. The majority, who indulge in this practice, jumping queues to form six to eight lanes, consider themselves clever. Among them are those said to be highly educated. It thus becomes clear that intellectual attainment does not by itself make man, but the cultivation of inner integrity. What does this mean? I will come to it presently. If all those in the wanton conduct listed in the foregoing get away with their activities, the housemaid will ask, “Where is justice?” The employer will ask where justice is. So will the workers. So will the governed whose resources have been squandered by an-all powerful governor and legislators who live in uncaring splendor. So will the man whose vehicle has been bashed, and help is not forthcoming for redress from the police or the courts.

These are observable manifest traits. What about activities in the thoughts? We may have observed that an average man lives in thoughts than in actions. He succeeds in hiding himself, his true identity in his actions, and even more in his thoughts. His real intentions are not known. And in the thoughts all scheming first take place. It is what cometh out of a man that defiles him, not what goes into him, so says the Lord Jesus Christ. And we are told to bridle our tongue which is described as an unruly animal. From the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, sayeth the Lord. How come we are perplexed by the man’s fate or that of his neighbour? Or of his country since individuals constitute the units of a nation. A nation of dishonest people is expecting a visionary, honest leader! And it is from their ranks that candidates emerge to jostle for the reins of leadership. If the Creator does not stretch His loving hands to release them from their leaders He is accused of injustice. They ask: Why is He just to Switzerland, to Canada and Netherland, but unjust to Somalia, Afghanistan, Yemen, Venezuela and Nigeria?

The justice of life is that a queen who ill-treats her helpers and escorts, may at some time in the future be a housemaid so that if she herself experiences evil she will move away from it to, in love, become a better person. The governor, transformed in say, 120 years later, will camp in front of the gates of the mansion he built from embezzlement—now a beggar, but is unable to recognise himself. He finds himself constantly drawn to the building but lacks comprehension. A mother who abandoned her baby will also be abandoned. It may be in the next 200 or even 1, 000 years. That is the justice of the Most High which proverbially grinds slowly, but surely and exceedingly fine. A government’s policies only help to engender the circumstances for the materialisation of the deserved fate. Sunny Ade once sang: “Let the wicked remember tomorrow.” Which tomorrow was he referring to? It could be 3, 000 years, 5,000 years or even 45 years from today. Examples can be multiplied. Out of ignorance, victims of blows of fate often ascribe their experiences to ill-luck or machinations of enemies. Once a prophet can be found to identify any of the enemies, the battle line is drawn. The tormented man frantically goes in search of a spiritual contractor or a prayer warrior to whom he surrenders himself unreservedly. Every little thought is taken to the spiritual man who habitually divines when he can travel and when he can go nowhere as luck will not attend his way should he venture out. Ultimately, he finds that his woes have not gone away nor abated. He prays and fasts, yet his conditions are no better than those of his neighbours who do not do any of these. Consequently he gives up spiritual pursuits to swell the ranks of scoffers.

At this juncture, it is pertinent to discuss the mechanisms of threads of fate, that is how fate is formed. Thoughts, speeches and thoughts combine to produce a man’s carpet of fate. Three weavings issue from each person. With every volition, whether thought volition or spiritual volition which precedes action if the author wants, as it invariably and frequently happens, to go beyond mere thoughts, pressure is exerted and threads spring from the volition as they do from deeds and speeches. If nothing emanates from speeches, how come that some speeches are calming and soothing while others evoke anger. In every intuitively perceived thought, there is a creative power dwelling in it. In other words, as we are told in the revelation of enlightenment spreading on earth today, when there is volition by any person, waves arise from his spirit which exerts pressure, with pressure movement. Movement gives rise to heat and heat to radiations. The radiations are what he supplies to the loom of Creation for the weaving of the carpet of fate. I have gone this length to show that thoughts and speeches are not as inactive and harmless as they may appear to be such that we can permit all manner of thoughts. Both thoughts and speeches debate or uplift a person.

To really understand the concept of fate, we must be prepared to live, so to speak, in the world unseen, which though unseen, nonetheless exists? Who has seen an atom or electron? Who can see bacteria with his naked eyes? Who has seen the air we breathe? Who has seen heat? Who sees television pictures or radio sounds as they penetrate our walls and settle in our television boxes or radio sets? Who even knows they are there until these sets are turned on. The point being made is that there is life other than we see in existence. Humans and animals are, therefore, not the only beings in existence. We see and feel only what lies within the range of our eyes to see and our other senses to feel. We do not see things that vibrate in very low rhythm, nor do we see or feel those of ultra vibrations. Somehow, our frame of experiencing lies in-between. The world is organised on energy levels!

New Year Resolutions may appear lacking in tangibility; nevertheless, they set the tone for our carpet of fate through the currents of radiations they generate for the loom of Creation for the weaving of the tapestry of our fate.