Dear Son,

“Life isn’t fair. Get used to it.” - Bill Gates

In your last letter you wanted to share this quote with me. Sorry son – the quote seemed a bit cynical to me. I do not agree with Bill Gates.

I’ve had more than my share of ugliness - sickness, death, betrayal and just plain horrible stuff.

But I still think life is fair in the balance of all things.

It does depend on how you define ‘fair’, now doesn’t it? If ‘fair’ means that everyone gets exactly what they want all the time - then the world probably isn’t fair.

Or, is ‘fair’ getting what you want part of the time - with a few tough times thrown in as reasonable balance? Does fair apply as a balance across the populace or is it just about our own personal experience of fairness?

What if something you believe to be fair is actually perceived as unfair by someone else? What’s fair then? What about human responsibility for fairness? I also believe that acts of humanity influence our collective energy - and the fairness of our lives.

Crashed Finance Companies were one example.

Those business leaders did things that were beyond unfair - and their actions brought a wide spread unfair impact to our economy. Does that mean life isn’t fair? Seems to me a select few brought that unfairness on all of us.

Life is as fair as you make it and is subjective to the person perceiving his own life and what life has dealt.

In my theory two words relate to this topic of fairness of life and life in general.

Those two words are destiny and fate. Destiny is what we actively do to make things happen in our lives. Debatably, fate consists of events that are beyond our control. We have all experienced and seen events that ‘just happen’.

Examples of this include earth quakes, tsunamis, plane crashes, cancer, disease or a simple freak accident, all pertaining to fate.

Things happen that we cannot control. We should not go around worrying about them and the ‘what if’s’. In truth, life is how we see it and what we make of a given situation.

My Dear Son, you should see adversity as a learning experience and not something unfair.

As you look at your life you will see that some of your work has gone unrewarded and unappreciated but these will serve you as life lessons. When I say ‘life lesson’ it doesn’t mean you should necessarily change your good intentions, but rather the way you look at the outcome.

If you choose to seek disappointment from your actions, you will find it. Rather you should look at your daily actions as if you are giving your energy, time or effort without expectation of any return from another. In short, life is what you make of it: there is no ‘fair’, it’s what you want it to be.

I believe I gave you some worthwhile advice.

Until next week,

Always yours, Thaththi