Public Opinion is a Weak Tyrant
Compared with our Private opinion,
Which is which Determines our Fate²
Out from the Cruel, lashing Sting of the
World’s Merciless Hate – the Soul to the
Desert comes to grapple its chance with Fate³
Until you make the Unconscious Conscious, it
Will Direct your Life – and you will call it Fate⁴
Destiny: a calling that creates a Beautiful Journey⁵
Laughers? Yes, Laughers, Laughers, Laughers –
Loud-Mouthed Laughers, in the Hands of Fate⁶
As one’s real Power grows & their Knowledge
Widens, ever the way they can Follow grows
Narrower – until at last they choose Nothing,
But do only and wholly what they Must do⁷
Superiority to Fate is Difficult to gain: ‘tis
Not Conferred of any but possible to Earn⁸
To whom Fate comes from the Outside, it
Kills him as the Arrow kills the Deer – to
Whomsoever fate comes from Within, it
Empowers them and makes them a God⁹
Accept whatever comes Woven in the
Pattern of your Destiny – for what
Could more aptly fit your Needs?¹⁰
¹ Gene Derwood, Elegy
² Henry David Thoreau, Walden
³ Yolande Langworthy, Drifting Sands and a Caravan
⁴ Carl Jung tr. unknown, Aion
⁵ Adrienne Maree Brown, Emergent Strategy
⁶ Langston Hughes, Laughers
⁷ Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea
⁸ Emily Dickinson, Superiority to Fate
⁹ Hermann Hesse tr. Ralph Freedman, quoted in introduction to Siddhartha
¹⁰ Marcus Aurelius tr. unknown