RE: How Can Free Will and Fate Coexist? (You're unlikely to find the answer in this post)
I did not suggest such a topic, ... well, because it already has an answer, but most people do not want to hear it. They don't want to know. They don't want to accept that much power or authority over their lives. Things just happen to them is far more comfortable.
Time is not really in a circle, time is in a loop(s).
Let us say that your life is a train track that goes around the world. So, at some point in the past you ran over a water buffalo. Well, sometime in your future, you are going to run over that same stinking corpse. That would be termed karma. Until you get out and clean up this rotten mess, you will keep experiencing it in your life, over and over.
Now, who put this train track down in the first place? You did. The you (spirit as you have called it) that exists outside of time. So, fate is you, the greater you, having decided on certain happenings in your life. Like meeting that special someone, which college (or not) that you go to, and many other things.
The problem with this view comes from our linear thinking.
The universe does not think linearly. It plots ways of getting you to your goal. Say, that was to meet that special someone, then the universe will cause a meeting, and a remeeting, and a remeeting to occur. You will just happen to be there, and they, will just happen to be there. (Imagine meeting that person while waiting in a terminal for connecting flights. 5 minutes you would be waiting, what are the chances of that?)
The other problem comes from the idea that there is a specific "special person", while there are multiple "special persons". Because each have their life timings, and free will. And so, A and B might not be ready, but C is, so you will have a destiny of meeting with C.
And if you try to map this all out, it becomes a huge mesh of interconnected points. Really mind blowing.
Enjoy
This is a spectacular analogy.
I don't see anything outside of time, even creation has a period of rest, both the Buddha and Jmannuel spoke directly of this. The only difference is that the time is so vast at those levels that we can hardly comprehended such enormity, it's a nice thought that there's a timeless "dimension" but clearly nobody is in two places at once or in two different dimensions or times, as there's no dimension without space, there's no dimension without time.
space and time are both a construct of the aether, or physical vacuum.
The Buddhist talk about getting off of the wheel of time.
Time is a dimmension in this world, and you can get outside of it, because it only exists in this little bubble.
So, you are correct, there is no timeless dimension. There is no time, or dimension from where the universe has sprung.
Kinda off topic but I thought it cool was spotting A Wrinkle in Time at the end of the aisles at our grocery store, seems Disney made it into a movie. I don't know if it's a child's book or I'm easily captivated but I really liked the book, and that was before I even knew about Time Lords like Dr. Who.