One about Freedom
It all started when a good friend of mine asked me ‘yes, but, what does freedom mean? And why would you want to be free?’.
Let me give you a bit of background information: my two best friends have split up after being together for almost 10 years (they would have celebrated this special milestone next month) but, life decided to shake things up, in fact, things weren’t shaking at all for a while, hence the decision to be a part. Now, you are probably asking yourself a lot of questions: what happened? Who took the decision? 10 years is a long time — I’m sure it’s not over; etc etc etc.
The point is that the main reason was, and is: freedom. Something one of them has decided to pursue and the other doesn’t quite support. So, when my friend asked me the fateful question, I was sincerely shocked.
I have, myself, experienced freedom since I can ever remember so it really hurt me when my friend didn’t quite get it. So in the past few days I have been really thinking about it and decided that there is no better way for me to write it all down and, hopefully, gather enough reasons for him to understand.
Freedom is the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants.
But don’t you agree that this limits its purpose/justification? Freedom -for me- means being able to de-attach yourself from any pre-judgement, condition or circumstance (whether this has been imposed to you via education, culture or society); it means that you are totally free to think, act, speak and believe anything you impose yourself and it also means that you don’t have -by any means- to answer to anybody else a part from yourself.
In this circumstances, freedom means that you are welcome and entitled to make any decisions, despite any on-going relationship. And, I already know this is going to annoy people but I stand for my point and certainly live my relationship by these means.
What is the point of sharing a life with someone else if we cannot support and embrace each other’s decisions and their consequences?
In all this, I was reminded how much we take for granted certain aspects of our lives and how much we often forget that people around us don’t necessarily understand our decisions.
For me freedom, is the most important decision in an adult’s life; I say adult because children’s freedom is inherent and I say decision because for me it’s a choice.
And lastly, I think it’s the best gift you can ever wish for someone; so here it is my friend, I wish you to feel free, when you are ready to.
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I’d love to hear about what ‘freedom’ and ‘free’ mean to you!!!
[NB: I can’t promise any future edits or follow ups re the topic.]
