This is a far more intriguing question than I first thought. Because, what does freedom mean to me? Do I have it and didn’t realise it? Or am I completely trapped? Can anyone truly be free? Is anyone truly trapped? The simple answer is, I don’t really know. Because while I have said I want to be free, I have never actually defined what that means for me in an holistic sense.
Like most people, I want to be financially free. Equally, I want to be able to do what I want, when I want. The question is – are those two things mutually exclusive? And does freedom mean being single and childless? I am neither of those things. Then there are the more internal things, freedom of expression. The freedom to think how I please, to have the freedom to formulate my own opinions. But do we truly have the freedom to express them as we wish given we do have a responsibility to the wider community to not be deliberately offensive? And do we have the freedom to take offence yet not stymie anyone’s right and ability to express their opinions? Is the definition of freedom possible when we live in a populated world? Are we free to do whatever we want regardless of the impact on nature? Should we be free to do so?
Freedom, I think, comes with responsibility, however it is interpreted, because it invariably brings with it a set of actions that have an impact on other people. And we should never, I think, be so free that we do not consider that.
I would love to be able to travel the world, but I am aware that my desire to do so has a negative impact on the environment. So, should I stay at home? How does that broaden my mind to be tolerant of all? I do firmly believe that our lack of tolerance comes from a fear of the unknown – so, if we don’t travel we don’t unravel the unknown. But travel has a negative impact on the environment. It’s a vicious circle.
So, freedom. What does it mean to me? I’m not sure I’m any wiser at this point. I’m not sure I haven’t argued myself into a cul de sac! So, let’s break it down. I want to be financially free and for me, that means living a comfortable life with my bills paid effortlessly and easily with enough money left over to save, donate, invest, and spend. I want to be free in my work insofar as I don’t want to be constrained by a 9-5 anymore working for someone else. I want to have the freedom to write, to be of service, and earn an income that way. I can do it anywhere, and I can write what I please. I know many will say that is a pipe dream, it’s unachievable, but I firmly believe we can do it. I firmly believe that a living can be made by writing. Yes, it takes time. Yes, it can be a slog. But it can be done.
The tricky part is, I’m not sure I want to be constrained by a place. I think I want to be itinerant, a digital nomad I guess. Tricky for all the environmental issues I’ve said above, but also because I have a son who doesn’t want to be itinerant, who wants to be able to see his friends regularly and have the steadying influence of a bricks and mortar school. And it is his right to want, and even have, those things. I also have a husband who says he would do the itinerant thing, but really he is a homebody. He would prefer to stay in one place, preferably in Italy, rather than do the roaming I would love to do. So, there are three people here whose ideal is not the same – freedom coming with responsibility for others.
As I think about it, I guess freedom means to me having choice in this instance. Having the choice to come to an agreement as to how we can keep all of us happy at the same time.
Maybe, fundamentally, that is what freedom is to me. Choice. The choice to do the things I want to do. Maybe I want certain things because right now, I don’t feel I have a choice – I can’t necessarily have them. Or do I want them because I can’t have them. Is it even true that I can’t have them? Is it all about perception? It’s difficult when we feel choice is removed from us, when things we have taken for granted are then taken away.
We have one car at the moment whereas we used to have two, and there was a time when I felt that my freedom had been removed from me because there is no public transport where we live, and the walk to the nearest shop is about two miles of unpavemented road for over half of that. On the face of it, when my husband is at work and I am not out at work, I am trapped. Yet, as I think about it, I don’t feel that way. Because it gives me the freedom to write, to do what I want to do while I am at home. I have that choice, which is a choice I would want to make. If I still had my own car, I might waste time doing things I don’t really need, or even want, to do in that moment. Things I feel I ‘should’ do. But that time could have been spent writing, which I would always prefer to do. So, it’s in how you look at choice.
So, yes, I think freedom for me means choice. Having the choice to do things, to think things. A mindset, almost a perception. Viktor Frankl wrote:
‘Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response is our growth and freedom.’
He wrote this about his time as a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp in his seminal work ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’. When you are in fear, when you are poor, when you are feeling oppressed, you do still have a choice. You can choose, as some of Frankl’s co-prisoners did, to give into the fear and expect death, or you can choose to react as Frankl did and harbour the desire for release from prison. The choice to free yourself from the question of ‘why me’ or trying to figure out the why of the thing, instead know that you will prevail. In effect, to keep the freedom of believing that you will survive whatever is happening to you in that moment. That you will, at some point, be free in whatever way that means for you. It is the stuff of revolutions. It is the stuff of seismic societal change. And it is the stuff of your own freedoms. It is in the mindset you apply to circumstances.
Freedom, for me, is the choice in how we react to whatever is going on in our lives, and choosing something different. Choosing to see things in a different way, a more positive way, accepting where you are but knowing that you have the freedom to change it. It’s about choosing to live consciously, not unconsciously. Choosing to not be a victim of circumstance but to be the creator of your own reality. Because as people like Viktor Frankl, Rosa Parks, Nelson Mandela, Ghandi, and countless revolutionaries have shown, you can be the difference you want to see in the world.
That, to me, is freedom.
Louisa Simpson 