Albert Einstein suggested that the most important question we can ask ourselves is whether or not the universe we live in is friendly or hostile, and that your answer to that question shapes your destiny.
Note that this is Einstein we’re talking about here — not some feel-good, “power of positive thinking” guru. Einstein was a fairly serious fellow, famous for rigorous, highly-intelligent, and insightful scientific thinking, not for airy-fairy notions of the rose-colored-glasses variety.
The implications of this hypothesis are profound. If you believe the universe is friendly, your perceptions, thoughts, and behavior are shaped by that belief. And, if you believe the opposite — that the universe is fundamentally hostile — your perceptions, thoughts, and behavior are shaped by that belief.
Our emotions arise from our thoughts, and the negative thinking produced by trying to survive in a universe you believe to be hostile generates negative emotions such as depression and anger. And, in turn, negative thoughts and emotions shape behaviors that elicit negative responses in others, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.
We’ve all known people like this; folks who believe the universe is hostile. In my experience, people in that mindset have more difficulty in life than their more positive counterparts. And yet we all live in the same universe.
The Friendly Universe folks’ behavior is shaped by positivity, and the results they reap tend to, in turn, reinforce their positivity. Another self-fulfilling prophecy, but one with healthy, desirable results. Their belief shapes behavior that elicits consequences that reinforce their beliefs.
Perhaps you’re feeling skeptical about all this. You can test the hypothesis empirically yourself. Though your belief about the universe’s friendliness, hostility, or indifference was shaped largely in childhood, you can “try on” the belief in friendliness, and see what it yields — say, for a week. At the end of the week, reflect on your experience. What effect, if any, did operating from this belief have on your mood, outlook, and experience? Did people respond to you differently than usual?
A final note: Believing in a friendly universe does not mean turning a blind eye to hostility in that universe. Even the briefest of glances at this morning’s newspaper will confirm the existence of hostility, and during your experimenting you very well may encounter hostility in other people. The goal here isn’t to pick out evidence to support either side of the question; the goal is to investigate the measurable effects of your belief in a larger, universal friendliness or hostility.
