Jennings 1

Abegail Jennings
Professor Johnathan Wood
Intro to Philosophy
30 April 2014
Free Will
Free will is necessary while living within the laws of a civilized society, that we can grow
as individuals and not as a clone of a life pre-planned for us. Our gift of free will allows us to
learn the survival skills we will gradually build upon in order to be able to stand as a part of
society, while maintaining individuality. Importantly, free will allows us to build our belief
system through trial and error. In turn, we will be able to take these tools and form our own life
path through choice and decision.
At each stage of life, infancy, childhood, adolescence and adulthood, we live within the
parameters of the caretakers/ laws that govern our life but have our own free will to decide how
we want to live. A small infant can choose to cry for hours if he is not held all the time. It is free
will. It is my belief that the existence of God gives us free will, which we will stand on our own
choices and decisions. I believe that parents should raise their children by providing them with
experience that will strengthen them that they will be able to move forward and stand alone.
Taking over a childs life experiences will cripple the growing process. The cycle of free will
repeats it and a young man or woman will go on to form their own family unit. If not, we would
exist as robots, doing what we were told and when we were told to do it. Our society would
most likely exist in a totalitarian state.
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An infant is helpless without the governing of his parents, yet; the child still must have
free will to learn the basics of survival. He suckles when he feels hungry, he sleeps when he is
tired and learns how to communicate within the family unit thru facial expression, crying and
laughing. He is exercising free will within the structure of his home and already is beginning to
form a value system. Unconditional love begins at this time and is vital as he learns bonding,
caring and forms relationships within his family unit. He also begins to form basic rules of
safety as under the watchful eye of his parents; he curiously and proudly exercises free will as he
explores the living room, and learning to crawl which then gives him the courage to walk. Many
lessons are learned of how to navigate in the world during this time. If the young child is denied
free will to explore his world, his existence at this time would primarily be that of survival, much
like the animal kingdom.
As a child moves into adolescence, he leaves the confines of his home and begins to
branch out into many new experiences. A good majority of these are done without the watchful
eye of his parents. He spends the majority of his time in a structured school environment. Yet,
the experience is different for each child even though they are subject to a structured
environment, the same lessons and instructors watching over them. A good example of free will
at this stage of development is how he responds to an assignment. He has free will to decide if
he wants to complete it, how much of his time will go into its completion and finally, what he
desires to write about. As he goes through the education process, he begins to learn
consequence. For example, some life decisions at this time can affect whether he is able to get
into college. Again, free will is always his. He has the advice of his instructors, the guidance of
his parents and peers. The final result is always his.
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Living in America affords young men and women opportunity on an endless scale. At
this stage in our life, it seems our peers are most important to us as we listen to their advice. We
begin to understand on a higher level that we have taken a path through life weaving in and out
of guidance from many sources. In the end though, we have always had our free will. We will
often look back with regret for a choice we made. Still, just the act of looking back and
analyzing our choice at that time is an exercise of free will. It is a gift from God. It does not
mean that our lives will always be better because of it. Sometimes there are so many variables
involved in a decision, we overthink and feel like we are trying to get thru a maze.
Consequently, I feel that free will must be based on a belief system that we learn as we go
through life.
In order to exercise free will, I think we must listen carefully to what some call intuition,
and I call the Holy Spirit. I believe our body always tries to honor us if we will just listen. The
only way to reach the highest achievements possible in all areas of our life is thru our learning
experience, trial and error, free will. I do not think our species could survive without free will.
We would not have the desire to try something over and over, until we got it right. There is great
satisfaction in a decision that becomes a reward. It motivates us to move forward and to use our
God given brain to grow ever higher.




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Sources Cited
Justet, Marti. Personal interview. 27 April 2014.
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