Something that seems consistent with humans when we worry about something, is that we try and predict the future. We try to build up all these possible outcomes of a situation in our head and, most likely, choose the absolute worst option that leaves us traumatised and our dreams tainted.
Why do we let ourselves play the wheel of fortune when we have no promising grantee of the result? According to an article written by Charles Roxburgh, scenarios allow the strategist to steer a path between a forecast’s false certainty and the misperceiving panic that often strikes in difficult situations. Scenarios boast several benefits when well fortune told, but they can also lay traps for the unwary. Unfortunately, more often than not, we fall for those traps and it creates even more worry or even disappointment.
Developmental psychologist Jean Piaget noted that the distinction between the subjective environments in children’s minds and the outer objective world is complicated for young children. Therefore, according to Piaget, children often assume that their thoughts will trigger things to happen directly, such as thinking angry thoughts about a younger sibling which is known in the Psychology world as magical thinking. Piaget, however, suggested that children outgrow this by the age 7.
This is where Piaget may not be 100% correct. Many adults prefer to participate in different forms of magical thinking. Witness the immense popularity of The Rule of Attraction, which states that events are attracted into our lives by our feelings. For many of us, the belief that expecting anything to happen would make it happen is difficult to let go of.
At the end of the day, no scientific evidence suggests that any human can predict the future, well at least not on purpose, so stop trying to fortune tell. It leads to unnecessary anxiety and heartache. Rather focus on the present and everything you can do now because right now matters a lot more than a 'what if' in the future.