Growing in the former USSR I heard so much about free will. However, my personal experience proved me that there is no such a thing as free will. I found an article written by Rav Michael Laitman called “The Freedom”: http://www.kabbalah.info/engkab/matan_torah/freedom.htm
From the article:
"Pleasure and Pain
However, when we examine the acts of an individual we shall find them compulsory. He is compelled to do them and has no freedom of choice. In a sense, he is like a stew, cooking on a stove; it has no choice but to cook. Providence has harnessed life with two chains: pleasure and pain. All living creatures have no freedom of choice between pleasure and pain, and the only advantage man has over animals is that he can aim at a remote target. That is he can agree to a certain amount of current pain, out of choice of future benefit or pleasure, to be attained after some time.
But in fact there is no more than a seemingly commercial calculation here. Meaning that the future benefit or pleasure, seems greater than the current pain or agony one feels at the moment. There is only a matter of deduction here, that the pain is deducted from the aspired pleasure, and there remains some extra.
Thus only pleasure is extended. And so it sometimes happen, that one is tormented, because one did not find the pleasure one attained, to be the surplus one had hoped for, compared to the agony one suffered, and therefore one is in deficit. It is all done as merchants do.
And when all is said and done, there is no difference here between man and animal. And if that is the case, there is no free choice whatsoever, but a pulling force, attracting toward any bypassing pleasure, and rejecting from painful circumstances. And providence leads them to every place it chooses by means of these two forces, without asking their opinion in the matter.
Even the determination of the type of pleasure or the benefit, are entirely out of one’s own free choice, but rather follows the desire of others. For example: I sit, I dress, I speak, I eat. I do all these not because I want to sit that way, or talk that way, or dress that way or eat that way. I do it because others want me to sit, dress, talk and eat that way; it is in accordance with the desires of society, not my own free will.
Furthermore, in most cases, I do these things against my will. For I would feel a lot more comfortable behaving simply, not carrying any burden. But I am chained in every movement to the flavors and manners of others, which make up the society.
So you tell me, where is my freedom of choice? On the other hand, if we assume that the will has no freedom, then we are all like machines, operating and creating through external forces, which makes it act the way it does. That means that we are all incarcerated in the prison of providence, which, using these two chains - pleasure and pain - pushes and pulls us to its will, to where it sees fit.
It turns out that there seems to be no such thing as selfishness in the world, since no one here is free and stands on his own two feet. I am not the owner of the act, and I am not the performer because I want to perform, but I am performed upon, in a compulsory manner, without consideration of my own opinion. Therefore reward and punishment become extinct.
And it is quite odd not only for the orthodox, who believe in His providence, and can rely on Him and trust that he aims only for the best in every act. It is even stranger for those who believe in nature, since according to the above, we are all incarcerated by the chains of blind nature, with no awareness or accountability. And we, the chosen species, one of mind and knowledge, have become a toy in the hands of blind nature, leading us astray, and who knows where? "
