How to Predict Your Future

How many times have you seen a friend in a relationship that was going downhill, and you could just tell it was going to end badly, yet your friend was oblivious to it?

It's hard to get past our own biases and see where our own path is likely to lead, but we can often seem to predict where other people's paths are going.

A simple predictive exercise

Take a moment to think about someone you know fairly well but whose life you don't have a major emotional investment in, perhaps a co-worker or business associate but not a relative or significant other. Given what you know about this person, where do you think s/he will be five years from now? What will be the status of this person's career, relationships, health, spiritual beliefs, financial situation, etc? Which areas will improve? Which will decline? Which will remain relatively unchanged?

Don't worry about being perfectly accurate. Just make your best guess. For now, let's set aside the possibility of extraordinary events like death and dismemberment.

You don't have to write them down, but get clear about what some of your predictions will be. Say them out loud or at least mentally verbalize them. Will this person gain weight, lose weight, or remain the same? Will his/her income go up or down? Will s/he have the same career? Will s/he begin, end, or maintain a relationship? Will you two still know each other?

Please take a minute or two to do this now before reading on....

Understanding your predictions

Now let's set aside your actual predictions and instead focus on how you actually made these predictions. What factors did you consider?

Here are some you may have taken into consideration (either consciously or unconsciously):

Did you consider this person's:

* behavior patterns

* habits

* past/history

* environment (home, work environment)

* social relationships (family, co-workers, boyfriend/girlfriend, relationship prospects)

* job/career

* spiritual/religious beliefs

* financial situation (income, cash, debt)

* possessions

* addictions

* health/diet

* physical attributes (appearance, weight, hygiene)

* genetics

* personality

* character (honesty, self-discipline, courage)

My guess is that you considered at least some of the above, either consciously or unconsciously. You probably took a snapshot of where the person is today and where they've been in the past and projected it forward in time. It's like a physics problem. You try to ascertain the object's position, velocity, and acceleration, and this allows you to predict with some degree of accuracy where it will be at some future time.

Make a mental note of whichever criteria on the list above you considered in making your prediction. What else did you consider that isn't on that list? You don't have to write them down. Just mentally verbalize the criteria you feel you used in making your predictions.

It's OK if you made your predictions based largely on instinct and intuition instead of trying to apply some rational criteria. I don't expect you to have used a structured process here. If you relied mostly on your intuition to make your future predictions about your friend, take a guess at what criteria your intuition considered important. Again, don't worry about being perfectly accurate. Just try to gain some clarity as to how you might have made your predictions, even if the actual process your mind used appears mysterious.

What's missing?

Now let me ask you this... How strongly did you base your predictions on the person's own consciousness? Did you even consider this factor at all? Did you consider the person's free will? Did you consider this person's ability to make decisions and thereby consciously create his/her own life? Did you consider this person's goals, dreams, and plans for the future?

Did you see your friend largely as a product of their environment, genetics, current behavior patterns or as a product of their own conscious choice?

Now what would happen if someone you know read this blog entry and used your life as the target for their predictions? Would they make their predictions based on perceiving you as a conscious, highly aware human being? Or would they assume that your consciousness wouldn't really have much say in where you are five years hence?

How accurately do you think your friend's predictions about you would be? Can your future be predicted with reasonable accuracy without reference to your own consciousness?

How much say in the matter does your conscious mind actually have? Is your consciousness running the show or merely observing the show? To what degree are you consciously directing how your life unfolds?

Obviously there's going to be some overlap between your conscious thoughts and your behavior and environment. But to the degree that incongruencies exist, which is the stronger presence in your life?

For example, if your habits and environment are such that you tend to be fairly messy and disorganized, but in your conscious mind you've made the decision to be a neat and well-organized person, which will be the winner five years from now? How would your friends place their wagers? Would they be right?

How conscious are you?

Predicting your own future

How would you predict your own future? Would you apply the same criteria you used for your friend? Would you base your decision mainly on environmental and behavioral factors or on the strength of your conscious mind? Would your decision be based mostly on your past and present or on your consciously chosen vision of your future?

Which criteria would be the most accurate? If a brilliant scientist were to attempt to predict your future as accurately as possible, what factors would s/he find significant, and what weight would be assigned to each factor?

What level of predictive significance would your consciously-chosen goals receive? 0%? 1%? 5%? 10%? 20%? 50%? 90%?

Do you even have a conscious vision of your future? What is it?