Freedom
I stopped seeing someone I had been on a few dates with and it didn't end so well. From the very get go, I told her I don't know about seeing her every weekend since we both work and I like having weekends to myself sometimes. She did NOT like hearing that, and said guys are always obsessed with "freedom". The freedom I'm talking about is not the United States of America freedom, but the sort of freedom any human would seek after survival is addressed. This breakup has given me a lot to think about, and it always circles back to the concept of freedom.
This is a note timestamped April 2018 when I was visiting my family last year:
Too much freedom or too little freedom. Living by myself, I often ask "what should I do today" or "how should I spend my time". Living with family, my time is spent with them, escaping them, working with them or for them, talking to them, eating with them, and the only escape is to sleep. All of my time revolves around the family unit. This bond is strong because normally i dont question it, but moments like these at night where my brain is running on fumes and the weird anxiety/depression envelops my mind in waves, I can clearly see the stark difference between a family life and a life alone.
Freedom, in one sense, is the freedom from other people. This rings especially true for someone my age because I'm suddenly free from my parents. I don't have to deal with their rules or their expectations. This doesn't stop at parents though, logically, because humans have all sorts of relationships in their lives: spouses, love interests, bosses, coworkers, friends, other family members, you name it. Every single one of these other people expect something from you. That's why everyone saves up for a vacation to "get away from it all" albeit for one to a few weeks. It's so liberating to just stay in and not go out with friends. The pursuit of this freedom from people can lead to loneliness.
I wrote this in a manic state a few weeks ago:
If you obsess over freedom, over time, you will realize the only true freedom is death. To be free from people, money, obligations, responsibilities, essentially the endless pursuit of desire and the endless pursuit from fear, it will come to light that this freedom you seek is the freedom from life itself.
It seems hypocritical. It might not make sense at first. When someone thinks of freedom, their first visual thoughts are a life on the beach, a long vacation, a debt-free life. However, these are not reality. Isn't every vacation you've taken expensive? Don't vacations only last a few weeks? Isn't most of your time spent working? This is reality. What is real Freedom, then? Is it unlimited time? Unlimited money? Both are key resources everyone on earth is fighting for. The desire for more free time and more money is the fuel for the working class.
Freedom, in an entirely different sense, is to have enough resources to enjoy life. The two main resources being of course Time and Money. Humblebrag here: I'm grateful to have enough of these two resources for the time being. I work full time at a well paying job, and the rest of my time is to myself with no other obligations or people to worry about since I moved across the continent from my hometown for this job. Anyways, if there's any takeaway from all of this, it's this: Time and Money is not enough for freedom. A lot of people carry the mentality that if they had all the time and money in the world they would be free.
Isn't this mentality wrong? Time and money can't be the answer to real, true freedom. The former description of freedom, freedom from people, is the real answer. Learning to live with them, appreciate them, or work with them is the key to freedom. People, when viewed this way, aren't obligations but pleasant additions to your life for they are free too.
This is a note timestamped April 2018 when I was visiting my family last year:
Too much freedom or too little freedom. Living by myself, I often ask "what should I do today" or "how should I spend my time". Living with family, my time is spent with them, escaping them, working with them or for them, talking to them, eating with them, and the only escape is to sleep. All of my time revolves around the family unit. This bond is strong because normally i dont question it, but moments like these at night where my brain is running on fumes and the weird anxiety/depression envelops my mind in waves, I can clearly see the stark difference between a family life and a life alone.
Freedom, in one sense, is the freedom from other people. This rings especially true for someone my age because I'm suddenly free from my parents. I don't have to deal with their rules or their expectations. This doesn't stop at parents though, logically, because humans have all sorts of relationships in their lives: spouses, love interests, bosses, coworkers, friends, other family members, you name it. Every single one of these other people expect something from you. That's why everyone saves up for a vacation to "get away from it all" albeit for one to a few weeks. It's so liberating to just stay in and not go out with friends. The pursuit of this freedom from people can lead to loneliness.
I wrote this in a manic state a few weeks ago:
If you obsess over freedom, over time, you will realize the only true freedom is death. To be free from people, money, obligations, responsibilities, essentially the endless pursuit of desire and the endless pursuit from fear, it will come to light that this freedom you seek is the freedom from life itself.
It seems hypocritical. It might not make sense at first. When someone thinks of freedom, their first visual thoughts are a life on the beach, a long vacation, a debt-free life. However, these are not reality. Isn't every vacation you've taken expensive? Don't vacations only last a few weeks? Isn't most of your time spent working? This is reality. What is real Freedom, then? Is it unlimited time? Unlimited money? Both are key resources everyone on earth is fighting for. The desire for more free time and more money is the fuel for the working class.
Freedom, in an entirely different sense, is to have enough resources to enjoy life. The two main resources being of course Time and Money. Humblebrag here: I'm grateful to have enough of these two resources for the time being. I work full time at a well paying job, and the rest of my time is to myself with no other obligations or people to worry about since I moved across the continent from my hometown for this job. Anyways, if there's any takeaway from all of this, it's this: Time and Money is not enough for freedom. A lot of people carry the mentality that if they had all the time and money in the world they would be free.
Isn't this mentality wrong? Time and money can't be the answer to real, true freedom. The former description of freedom, freedom from people, is the real answer. Learning to live with them, appreciate them, or work with them is the key to freedom. People, when viewed this way, aren't obligations but pleasant additions to your life for they are free too.