Connection fabric

Have you ever considered the intricate connections that are interwoven throughout the events of your life? In every moment, at every turn, whether we are aware of it or not, one thing leads to another and another and another. Nothing is independent or isolated. Nothing.
Pick one event in your life and try to eliminate it without impacting all the things connected to it. You cannot. When I look back, even at the most trying events, I can see connections that I would not like to loose. I learned something I needed to learn. I met someone I needed to meet. Those events launched something greater that I would not choose to give up.
Some say "everything happens for a reason". That statement has always troubled me because it implies that some greater force is orchestrating the events of our life in ways beyond our control. For many the idea that a wiser benevolent force is guiding all these things is comforting. I'm troubled to understand our personal responsibility in this context.
It seems to me that we are a great deal more responsible for the reason everything happens and for discovering the reason beyond the happening. We are the weavers of the fabric of our lives and we must learn that every strand has significance.
Is there a greater force? Yes. It's the connection. The strands of my life are not separate from yours. A thread has little strength and can easily be broken. Woven together - they have great strength. The more we understand that concept, the greater our strength. We can imagine this as strands of events in our life - interwoven with strands of events in other lives - interwoven in strands of events of the past and the future.
If I could talk to my younger self in times of trouble or in times of great decision - I would stress this. Everything that happens right now is tied to both yesterday and tomorrow. Choose connection. Choose to see the potential for strength and growth. Be connected now.