My wife and I joke about something called "The Line". I think it might be real.

My wife and I have this joke about something called “The Line”. It’s a mental thing that we’ve both observed a million times but it’s difficult to describe and put into words, but I’ll try my best to explain.<br><br>Here’s a good example: let’s say we’re driving and we’re coming up on a merge/intersection, we’ll pick a car and try to guess whether it’s going to go over “The Line”. We’ll guess whether it’s going to turn right, left, or go straight, and inevitably we’ll be right. We’re 90%+ accurate on our predictions, even if we pick the same car. It’s crazy. There will be a car 500 ft ahead of us that we can barely see, and we’ll be like: “I think that car is going to take the next right and go into the parking lot of the Chipotle”. And it always is. We’ve done this countless times and we’re always right, it’s actually a bit spooky. We joke that there’s some kind of collective unconscious thing going on, and we call it “The Line”. <br><br>The Line is the invisible barrier that separates the world of infinite possibilities from the world of reality. It’s the point at which a decision is made and all other possibilities cease to exist as reality. We call it a “Line” because it’s not actually a decision, but more of an observation. It’s the point at which the possibilities become realities and we can see/observe the outcome. <br><br>So for example, let’s say you walk up to a busy intersection and you’re trying to cross the street. At first, all of the cars have infinite possibilities - they can go wherever they want, and there are endless outcomes. But as you get closer to the intersection, you start to see the possibilities begin to shed away. You see a car 500ft ahead of you and it’s going 35mph, you know that it’s going to make it through the intersection before you cross. You see another car that’s a little closer, about 300ft away, and you can tell it’s not going to make it through in time. At some point, you become aware of a car that’s making the right turn onto your street. You’re still a bit away from the intersection, but you can tell the car is going to make the turn and is about halfway between the crosswalk and the intersection. You start to weigh your options, and you’re able to safely cross in front of the car. <br><br>In that situation, do you ever realize *when* you made the decision that you could safely cross? When did you go from standing still, watching the cars, to actively crossing the street? Sometimes you’ll see a car way ahead of you, but you’ll intuitively sense that you need to wait until it passes. You’ll know that there’s no way you’ll be able to cross before it gets there, so you’ll just wait. How do you know? That’s “The Line”. It’s the point at which you can see the possibilities and understand the outcome. It’s the point at which you stop thinking about it and take action. It’s the point at which possibilities become realities, and that’s not something we can control. It’s just a line we cross, and it’s what make life possible.