Many people imagine they would give almost anything to see what the future holds. For some that means knowing what would happen to them and to those they love. For others it means learning what would happen to the world, the U.S., or places in which they have lived. And a lot of people fantasize about the potential to make a fortune by using knowledge of the future to reap financial windfalls.
I happen to believe we are wonderfully blessed not to have that facility.
For certain, most people’s futures aren't the stuff of Hollywood films. We won’t be discovered by a famous movie director or become the next Lady Gaga or Michael Phelps. Neither will we win the mega-lottery and live a life of luxury. Nor will we make billions by inventing a miracle drug to cure cancer or a robot that walks and talks like a real person and plays better chess than Bobby Fisher.
The truth is many of us have lives that are ordinary and maybe even a little boring. But it is the uncertainty of the future that has driven us to become what we were not at a certain point in our lives. To paraphrase a famous saying, “Uncertainty is the mother of invention.” The problem of knowing the details of our personal future is that if we possessed that knowledge few of us would put out the effort needed to make that future reality.
In the case of my family, our mother never finished high school but our father graduated with a degree in accounting and business from St. Louis University in the heart of the Great Depression. The uncertainty of the future that they had faced became a force in the lives of their children, all three of whom attended college, graduating with bachelors’ and masters’ degrees. In addition, my older brother and I earned PhDs and became university professors and were successful in both public and private sectors. The uncertain future that we lived with as children made us all the more determined to succeed.
For most people, seeing the future would be a curse. It would rob their present of hope, spontaneity, promise, and choice. It would stifle determination and the drive for self-improvement. If we knew the future we would have nothing to dream about, nothing to strive for, and, in a critical way, nothing to live for.
I am convinced that we are much better people as a result of that particular type of blindness. It is because we can’t see the future that ordinary people are driven to become the world’s great success stories. Like Joanne Rowling, who as a single-parent on welfare was diagnosed with clinical depression and contemplated suicide in the months before her manuscript for the first Harry Potter book was finally accepted after being rejected by a dozen publishers. Or William Morris, a college drop-out truck driver who became Dale Chihuly's chief assistant and then a world famous glass artist due to his own tremendous talent. Or Paul Crutzen, who did so poorly on his college entrance exam (due to high fever and illness on exam day) that he was forced to attend a three-year technical institute instead of a four-year university but became a renown atmospheric scientist and was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry. Or Wilma Rudolph, who as a child was afflicted with polio and told by her doctor she would never walk normally and became one of America’s great sprinters, winning three Olympic Gold Medals. Not to mention the countless unsung heroes who struggled against daunting odds to become the successful teachers, firefighters, journalists, nurses, lawyers, electricians, accountants, and engineers among the many others who play essential roles in our lives.
In a critical way, we create a world of enormous possibility because we cannot see the future. And for that blindness we should be thankful.
