What are you doing today that someone else forced you to do? In your initial thought, it may seem as though there was nothing that you were forced into. That would be the optimistic view.
How do we know there aren’t greater forces at play? After all, the Apostle Paul said, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”1
Dostoevsky’s Demons beautifully articulates how a select group of individuals with strong ideas, forceful wills, and manipulative abilities can control the weaker minds of individuals who are after what all men want: life, love, happiness, and safety. The characters Pyotr Stepanovich Verkhovensky and Nikolai Stavrogin lead a group of revolutionaries to defy the current norm in Petersburg, and to overthrow the political regime for their own selfish gain.
The danger in following such leaders, is that the group who chooses to follow often does so out of their psychological need for conformity. As herd creatures, there is an instinct within every human that tells us to follow the pact and to find safety. The followers of these devious men were instinctively doing what they believe to be most likely to produce a favorable outcome for themselves, when it was what was most harmful.
There are forces at play larger than us, and if we have the humility, we can reconcile that when we decide who to follow, who to vote for, what to read, who to love, and ultimately how we live.
1English Standard Version Bible, Ephesians 6:12
Magis Thinking 
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