Right Place, Right Time
I been in the right place, but it must have been the wrong time
I'd have said the right thing, but I must have used the wrong line
I'd have took the right road, but I must have took a wrong turn
Would've made the right move, but I made it at the wrong time
_Dr John
There are two images that comprise the ideas of right place and right time (after of course, the timeless lyrics of Right Place Wrong Time by Dr. John) The first image is from the Bagv Gita showing a human life being incarnated and progressing over time towards death. It is an ideal image to illustrate the fact your optimal course of action depends in large part on where you are in your life journey. This idea borrows heavily from Erick Erikson's life stages theory which states that our moral development is set by the stage of life we are in. For example, the moral reasoning, life choices and decision-making process for a 5-year-old is totally different than for a 25-year-old. A 35-year-old has different choices than someone in the 50s, as someone in their 60s would be looking at a different world than someone in their 80s. We assert that not only do you have different choices and issues to confront over time, you actually live inside a totally different moral universe as you slip from one stage to the other through your life journey.
Your moral and ethical imperative as seen through dependants.
Dependencies are deeply moral in that they unfailingly solicit a moral demand for you to provision, care and love another person. They are in this module because dependencies are directly linked to what stage of life you are in. As a young child, you are a dependent, as a young adult much less so as a single adult you may reach a stage where you are dependent on no one and no one is dependent on you. As we progress with our growth and flourishing, we come not only to be able to take care of ourselves but learn to take care of others. Dependents we must respond to are our children, elderly people we care for, or anything that needs our time and attention to survive. As we progress through life, we start out as entirely dependent and then move towards greater freedom and autonomy and then eventually become dependent again in our old age. Again, dependencies mentioned here in this module because they are 1) a reliable indicator of your most proximate moral and ethical responsibilites and they 2) change and evolve over a complete lifespan in a consistent pattern.
Your personal wheel of fortune and the hand of fate
The medieval wheel of fortune is an ideal image to illustrate the concept that there are times in your life when you are rising and then falling in fortune. The moral wheel of fortune is like the moral version of the game show Wheel of Fortune. However, instead, it stands for personal and moral luck, moral circumstance and moral choices that provide you with chances to do good or be destroyed by bad fortune. The hand of fate is when we are handed moral circumstances that challenge our character and moral values. These circumstances seem to follow a four-part circular pattern: First of ascending fortune and growth, second thriving and full flourishing, third declining and withering, and fourth finally being crushed by fate before being resurrected.
The generational wheel of fortune and the hand of fate
As we pull out further, we can see the wheel of fortune has a multi-generational span as well. Each generation carries moral responsibility, financial and emotional baggage, and moral burdens from their ancestors’ decisions. Across multiple generations, it can be seen that the span of an entire family and extended clan's circumstances can pass through the wheel of fortune's stages. A family rises up from poverty with ambition, hard work, and moral strength, and reaches a peak in their financial and moral flourishing. Successive generations follow becoming increasingly soft and weak and the success and prestige of the family wanes, finally to be crushed in bankruptcy, lawsuits and moral miscalculation.
The Civilization wheel of fortune and the hand of fate.
From an even greater perspective, we can look at the wheel of fortune as it relates to entire civilizations. We can apply the four-part cycle to look at the way an entire civilization flourishes over centuries and thousands of years, and track the trends in cycles. Great moral awakenings, and spectacular furnishings in art and music, followed by decline and decay and finally collapse all mark the different stages of the wheel of fortune in civilizations. Civilizations have their rise with a certain set of moral virtues that define them: courage, honor, and justice. They flourish and thrive and bless their citizens and surrounding culture with their excellence. But just as moral virtue ascends, moral vice follows close behind and the wheel of fortune turns leading to decline and systemic collapse.