Are We Choosing — or Being Moved?

Introduction: Whose Choice Is This?

Right now, as you read this,
are you choosing to read?

Or were you led here?

Every day, we experience ourselves as decision-makers.

We choose:

• what to do
• what to think
• how to act

And yet, there is a persistent doubt:

Are these choices really ours?

A Paradox in the Bhagavad Gita

The Bhagavad Gita presents a striking tension.

On one hand, it urges action:

• Fulfill your dharma
• Stand up and act

On the other hand, it states:

“All actions are carried out by the qualities of nature (gunas).”

This suggests something paradoxical:

You act —
but you are also being moved.

Consulting Plum Blossom Divination

To explore this question symbolically, we turn to Meihua Yishu (Plum Blossom Divination).

The result:

Primary Hexagram: Wind over Thunder — Yi (Increase)

Changing Line: Top Line

Resulting Hexagram: Mountain over Thunder — Yi (Nourishment)

This sequence reveals a layered structure of influence and development.

I. Increase — The Power of Influence

The primary hexagram, Increase, represents augmentation.

Growth through external input.

Expansion through conditions.

This points to an important fact:

Human thought and behavior do not arise in isolation.

They are shaped by:

• environment
• upbringing
• culture
• biology
• past experience

What we call “choice” is already conditioned.

II. The Top Line — The Illusion of Autonomy

The top line warns against excess.

It suggests danger when one assumes total independence.

The belief in absolute, unconditioned free will
can itself be a misunderstanding.

It overlooks the vast network of influences
that shape every decision.

III. Nourishment — Cultivating Awareness

The resulting hexagram, Nourishment, shifts the focus inward.

It emphasizes:

• what we take in
• how we process experience
• how awareness is sustained

Here lies the key.

Free will is not absolute freedom from influence.

It is the ability to cultivate how we respond to influence.

IV. The Nature of Free Will

Many assume:

Free will = total independence.

But this model rarely holds up under scrutiny.

A more accurate structure is layered:

Layer 1: Conditions (Largely Given)

We do not choose:

• our birth
• our early environment
• many external circumstances

These shape our tendencies.

Layer 2: Awareness (Partially Open)

We can observe:

• our thoughts
• our impulses
• our reactions

This observation creates distance.

And within that distance,
something like freedom begins to appear.

V. The Provocative Insight

Absolute free will does not exist.

But neither does complete determinism.

There is a middle space.

And that space is where agency lives.

VI. The Gita’s Resolution

The Gita does not deny conditioning.

It acknowledges that nature acts.

But it introduces a crucial element:

Witnessing.

When you become aware of your impulses,
you are no longer entirely identified with them.

And that gap
is the beginning of freedom.

VII. The Deeper Structure

Increase → Nourishment

Influence → Cultivation
Conditioning → Awareness
Given → Developed

Freedom is not something you are born with in full.

It is something that can be grown.

Final Conclusion

Plum Blossom Divination suggests:

Human beings are shaped by conditions (Increase).

Belief in total autonomy is misleading (top line).

But through awareness, response can be cultivated (Nourishment).

Free will is not absolute.

But it is not nonexistent.

It exists as a developing capacity within structure.

Closing Reflection

Are you completely free?

No.

Are you completely controlled?

Also no.

The question is not whether free will exists in a perfect sense.

The question is:

How much awareness do you bring to your own actions?

Because within awareness,
even a small degree of freedom
can change everything.