Does fate exist?
Over the years I have provided BaZi consultations, I have been asked this question hundreds of times. Each time, I have noticed the same pattern: the more charts you analyze, the harder it becomes to answer.
On the one hand, practice shows that certain life events do indeed occur more often during periods the chart identifies as significant. On the other, it is impossible to ignore the role of the decisions a person makes throughout their life. The question of fate is therefore much deeper than it first appears.
Why almost every client asks this question
Many people have come to me for consultations over the years, and almost every meeting begins in a similar way. First, I study the birth chart: I analyze its structure, luck pillars, interactions between elements, clashes, changes in the chart’s balance, and key years that may prove significant for the person.
If you are just beginning to explore this method, it is helpful to build your own chart with the BaZi Calculator and see its complete structure. This is usually where any further analysis begins.
Only then do I ask questions.
— What was happening in your life during this period?
The answers are often remarkably precise. The person says that this was the very year they changed jobs, went through a divorce, moved to another city or country, started a business, received a promotion, or became a parent.
Of course, a BaZi chart does not show life as a finished script. It does not contain company names, people’s names, or specific addresses. But it very often points to periods when particular themes in life become especially active. Such coincidences do not happen only once—they recur again and again in different people’s charts.
This is why, for a practicing consultant, the question of fate gradually ceases to be purely philosophical. It becomes practical.
What a BaZi chart actually reveals
Perhaps the most common mistake is to see a BaZi chart as a collection of ready-made predictions. In reality, it works differently.
A chart reveals not specific events, but the conditions in which they may arise.
It reflects potential, strengths and weaknesses, favorable and challenging periods, and themes that may become more prominent at certain times. In a consultant’s practice, for example, a period of a powerful clash often coincides with moving, changing jobs, a change in marital status, or a major restructuring of one’s accustomed way of life. A clash does not automatically mean moving or losing a job, but it often points to a theme of change that later manifests through specific circumstances.
Likewise, a strengthening of certain elements guarantees neither wealth nor career growth. First, it is important to understand how useful the energy is for the particular chart; only then can its possible manifestation be discussed. This is why understanding useful BaZi elements is considered one of the key skills in chart analysis.
The same period can bring completely different results to two people. For one, an increased emphasis on career may lead to a promotion and broader opportunities. For another, it may bring serious responsibility, a heavy workload, and the need to make difficult decisions. The theme will be similar, but the form it takes will be entirely different.
In our approach, the chart is therefore a tool for analyzing a person’s conditions, limitations, and potential—not a mechanism of rigid predetermination.
Fate or free will?
Two opposing views are common today. The first holds that everything is predetermined and nothing can be changed. The second claims that a person can completely rewrite their fate and create any reality solely through the power of their decisions.
In practice, both positions seem overly simplistic. If everything were predetermined down to the smallest detail, there would be no point in analyzing periods, choosing favorable times, or making conscious decisions. But if a person were completely independent of time and circumstances, it would be difficult to explain why certain themes in life become active again and again during the same kinds of periods.
Practice suggests that reality lies somewhere between these extremes.
BaZi helps reveal not a finished life script, but the conditions in which that script unfolds.
Can your date of birth reveal your future?
People new to BaZi often ask this question. The answer is not as straightforward as it may seem.
If “the future” means an exact list of events that are guaranteed to happen, then no. A chart does not show a finished film of a person’s life. But when it comes to periods of opportunity, change, heightened risk, or important life themes, BaZi can indeed reveal certain patterns.
This is why many people use a BaZi forecast not as an attempt to guess the future, but as a tool for navigating time. This approach makes it possible to identify periods of heightened activity, potential areas of risk, and moments when conserving resources would be wiser.
We can see trends and understand which themes are becoming especially relevant. Their ultimate form, however, depends not only on time but on the person as well.
Reflections of an ancient historian
I often recall the words of Josephus:
“It is not given to people to escape their fate even when they foresee it.”
This thought sounds very convincing, but it inevitably raises another question. If fate cannot be changed, why try to understand it? Why study the patterns of time, analyze our own lives, and try to anticipate approaching changes?
Knowledge has value only when it helps a person make more conscious decisions. This is where the most interesting part begins.
Can fate be changed?
Over many years of practice, my answer to this question has gradually changed. I once believed there were two possibilities: either everything was predetermined or a person was completely free in their decisions. But the more charts I analyzed, the less I believed in either extreme.
We do not exist separately from time or circumstances, yet circumstances do not make our decisions for us. The question of fate therefore cannot be reduced either to complete predetermination or to absolute freedom of choice.
Imagine a mountain road. It has climbs, descents, and sharp turns. A turn will not disappear merely because the driver learns about it in advance, but this knowledge allows the driver to prepare: slow down, choose a safer line, and avoid unnecessary risk. The turn remains the same, while the consequences of navigating it may be completely different.
We cannot always change the situation itself. But we can change how we move through it.
Three kinds of luck in Eastern metaphysics
One of the most interesting explanations of this idea is found in the concept of three kinds of luck. It helps explain why Eastern metaphysics has never been reducible to simple fatalism.
Heaven Luck
Heaven Luck is what a person receives at birth. It includes the BaZi chart, innate traits, potential, and limitations. We do not choose the moment of our birth or our initial conditions.
This is the starting point of the journey.
Earth Luck
Earth Luck is associated with space: the home, work environment, surroundings, and conditions in which a person’s life unfolds. In Eastern metaphysics, space does not negate fate—it affects how easily or how difficultly existing potential is realized.
Feng Shui is therefore viewed not as a way to “correct fate,” but as a tool for working with the conditions of life. This relationship is explored especially clearly in the topic of the Connection Between BaZi and Feng Shui, because the two are rarely considered in isolation.
Human Luck
Human Luck consists of a person’s decisions, actions, and choices. This is where freedom lies. We cannot change the moment of our birth and cannot always change our circumstances quickly, but we can change our behavior, strategy, and attitude toward what is happening.
Imagine two people with very similar charts. One lives in a supportive environment, knows how to plan, makes considered decisions, and uses the opportunities of time. The other constantly acts amid chaos, ignores risks, and makes impulsive decisions. Their starting conditions may be similar, but their life outcomes will be completely different.
This is why Human Luck holds such an important place in Eastern metaphysics.
What can actually be changed
When people ask whether fate can be changed, they usually mean specific events. Can losing a job be avoided? Can a divorce be prevented? Can a difficult period be eliminated entirely? Practice suggests, however, that the question is usually different.
We cannot always change an event. But we can change its consequences.
We can prepare better for change, reduce risks, preserve resources, choose a more suitable moment for important decisions, recover more quickly after a difficult period, and see opportunities where we previously saw only problems. This is why Date Selection plays an important role in many branches of Eastern metaphysics. Even a small change in the starting moment can sometimes make it possible to navigate the same period much more calmly and effectively, and this can determine the final outcome.
Two people may experience similar periods very differently, not because one has a fate and the other does not, but because they interact differently with the circumstances of their lives. We cannot always change an event, but we can prepare better, recognize risks in advance, and make more considered decisions. This is the basis of a BaZi consultation: natal-chart analysis and action strategy—not an attempt to predict every detail of the future, but an effort to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the period and identify the most suitable strategy for action.
So, does fate exist?
After many years of working with charts, I cannot say with confidence that I know the answer. Practice, however, suggests one important thing: time matters, circumstances matter, space matters—and our decisions matter too.
Perhaps fate exists. But it is less like a prison cell from which escape is impossible, and less like a perfectly blank page on which anything can be written. It is more like a road with a particular terrain: some stretches are easier, some turns demand attention, and there are periods of acceleration and periods of restructuring. Some things genuinely lie beyond our control, but how we travel the road remains our choice.
Knowledge of the future may therefore be valuable not because it allows us to cancel fate, but because it helps us experience it more consciously. Perhaps the central question is not even whether fate exists.
What do we do with the conditions and opportunities we have been given?
What do you think?
Does fate exist? Or is our life solely the result of the decisions we make every day? If you could see the important turning points of your life in advance, would you want to change anything—or do we need knowledge of the future not to change fate, but to experience it more consciously?