Chance

"We are continually shaped by the forces of coincidence," he said. "Our lifelong certainties about the world can be demolished in a single second." (Paul Auster)

I think Paul Auster is such an important writer precisely because of his views about life and chance. While he writes, he tacitly states, one time after the other, that chance is the driving force of human life. The possibility of drawing conlcusions from events occured because of pure luck is essential for his literary style. In fact, my personal view about chance is very similar to what Auster expresses in his novel The Invention of Solitude. 

I believe that, many times, our life is driven by an autopilot. There are circumstances that we are not able to control, that end up affecting the development of our daily lifes. Nontheless, I think that this autopilot is not controled by "luck" itself. I think that, most of the times, God´s influence is what produces different types of events or circumstances that change our life´s route. 

Maybe, to say that God is the power behing changes and coincidences is just a way of being calmed and not to think that your life is just like a sailing ship in the middle of a storm. But, anyways, I do think that our free will and judgement capacity is limited by these events that happen out of our rational control.

For example, while I was presenting the SAT, alongside with hundreds of other young guys, it was pure luck what made a very good friend of mine, that I hadn´t seen in years because she was living on the other side of the globe, to be sitted besides me while presenting the exam. Thinking about all the coincidences in one´s life, I come up to a concluison that I believe is applicable for me and for many others: Chance (or God´s hand) is the deepest influence that causes changes in our life.